With his $12 million salary this year, Commonwealth Bank chief executive Ian Narev has become the latest poster boy for corporate excess, making 106 times that of an average Commonwealth Bank worker.
Nearly $10 million of his pay was in bonuses, while 25 per cent of the long term portion was awarded for customer satisfaction. from the ABC
Today I queued at the Commonwealth Bank opposite the Central Market. This sort of bank used to have a large line of tellers, but now it is down to one. There was an employee standing near the door ‘welcoming’ people who stepped in. I said to the lady in front of me that it would be better if that man was working instead of standing there.
She was elderly and bitter. She worked hard and paid her taxes for 50 years. Now she is treated like shit. She is treated like shit by society at large who thinks it can’t afford to pay her pension. She’s treated like shit by the bank. The same bank who employs the CEO who has apparently made $4M this year just for his customers being satisfied. How dare society, how dare the bank.
May I assure you, Mr Narev and the Commonwealth bank, that your customers are not satisfied. We do not want to wait an eternity for a teller. Once I had got to see the one teller in a bank which seemed to have lots of employees doing other things, we had this conversation.
Me: I’d like to get withdraw some money.
Teller: Hey, you could link your account up to a card and then use the machines.
Me: I don’t want to use machines, I want to stand in a queue and talk to a human being when I get to the top.
Teller: But you wouldn’t have to wait if you took my suggestion.
Me: If you took my suggestion and employed more tellers, I wouldn’t have to wait.
Teller: Do you have a financial adviser? I can organise an initially free appointment with a financial adviser for you.
Me: I could have said already, not unreasonably, I just want my fucking money. Is that too much to ask. Instead I said no thank you, I don’t want financial advise.
Teller: We’ve got some great Apps you can download to your phone.
Me: thinking WTF, this is how Mr Narev gets his customer satisfaction bonus? By getting this teller to harrass me instead of giving me my money?, said: I’m a Luddite, actually.
Teller: (thinking WTF’s a Luddite, no doubt) gives up. Offers me what I went in for in the first place.
Mr Narev, you should be ashamed of yourself, taking this money. You should employ more bank tellers. You should not use them to try to force services upon the customers.
Society, what are you thinking of? It’s not even your money, it’s her money, this lady who has paid her fair share of taxes and probably a contribution to make up for whatever Mr Narev avoids.
Our elderly citizens are angry. Something is wrong with our society. Something is wrong with a society so greedy for its bank dividends, it will kowtow to the excesses of men (sic) like Narev, whilst treating those they should be honouring like they are tedious interruptions to their time and their financial planning. Couldn’t we do better?
This and That 
Read more Philip K. Dick. In the Future, all these menial jobs will be done by robots, freeing people for exciting, creative tasks like posting on social media.
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While on the dole. Nice.
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Just to annoy you more – they’re going to charge you a fee for using the teller. aud$2.50-$5 per transaction, depending on your bank. I think they call it human-interface loading.
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Please tell me you jest. I am going in search of a new bank. As it happens, my finances are such that I could, if necessary, keep them under the mattress.
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hmmm… I have been doing the banking for the Senior Cat recently. The Cth insisted (after months of jogging along) that I had to have my own card to deal with his banking. I objected. They insisted. I got the card – and I have absolutely and utterly refused to activate it which means they have to look up the details each time. There’s a new manager who caused the best of the tellers to resign and another to demand a transfer. Pity. I got on well with them.
I went into ANZ last week. The local branch has just been “refurbished”. They are down to two places for teller and tell me there will normally only be one on duty – but they do have one of those welcome people. I was not impressed and neither was the teller.
They know better than to try and sell me anything by now…told them last time that I don’t have the sort of money that allows you to “invest” in anything except the bare basics.Grrrrrrr…..
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I was mystified as to why the teller saw anything in my account details that got him so excited.
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