, ,

UK Retail Banks Confront Rising Mental Health Challenges in Workforces

(London, UK) UK retail banking operations are facing a growing mental health challenge among frontline staff, driven by evolving role demands, rising customer aggression, and the complexities of hybrid work, according to new insights from Auriemma Group. Benchmarking data reveals a steady rise in mental health-related absences over the past year, prompting banks to rethink their workforce support strategies.

The data paints a clear trend: as self-service tools handle simpler queries, frontline agents are left to manage more complex and emotionally charged customer interactions. Since the pandemic, mental health absences have climbed, reflecting the increasing strain on employees.

Firms also report a notable increase in customer aggression, including threats and verbal abuse, further exacerbating stress levels. Hybrid work arrangements compound the issue, as remote teams navigate difficult conversations with less immediate peer or managerial support after tough calls, underscoring the need for fresh approaches.

“Banks are navigating a real shift in workforce dynamics,” says Nicole Toussaint, Senior Manager of Industry Roundtables at Auriemma Group. “Rising stress from customer interactions and hybrid work adjustments are challenging, but the industry is already exploring smart, proactive solutions.”

Industry Approaches to Address the Challenge

Auriemma Roundtable members have shared a variety of promising practices they are testing to support their teams and maintain performance:

  • Enhanced Manager Training: Firms are training managers to handle well-being discussions more effectively, with one program linking mental health support to improved performance. This fosters a supportive culture and helps staff access resources.
  • Flexible Workweek Trials: A four-day workweek pilot has shown promising results, reducing absences and lifting productivity, offering a balanced way to ease stress while maintaining service levels.
  • Onsite Welfare Support: For high-pressure roles, such as those handling vulnerable customers, some banks mandate onsite days to ensure direct and immediate welfare support, stabilising absence rates.
  • Cultural Reinforcement: Transparency boosts engagement—one firm uses town halls to share progress and purpose, while another limits agents to first-name interactions to reduce online harassment risks.
  • Supportive Policy Adjustments: Policy changes include expanded sick leave (one bank raised it to 25 days for severe cases) and teamwide transparency on absences, reinforcing personal accountability.
  • Tech-Enabled Resilience: AI-driven tools and speech analytics are being used to identify early burnout risks in complaint calls, suggest responses to lighten agents’ loads, and blend efficiency with care.

“Roundtable members are eager to help one another tackle this challenge at an industry level,” says Toussaint. “This topic will remain a focal point, especially as firms optimise their hybrid working strategies ahead of the 2026 Employment Rights Bill. Our goal is to support banks in building stronger, healthier teams.”

Auriemma Group invites banking and issuing leaders to explore these trends and solutions at the upcoming Customer Service and Complaints Roundtables in March and July 2025. To attend as our guests, please contact us via roundtables@auriemma.group.

/by
, , ,

Wrapping Up Another Great Set of Roundtables

Last week concluded our autumn set of roundtables, where we had representation from 23 financial services firms.

As always, the roundtables consisted of ample networking opportunities and engaging discussions. Some highlights from the meetings were:

  • Our Fraud Control Roundtable did deep dives into application and social engineering fraud trends and mitigation techniques.
  • Stephanie Fitzgerald opened up the Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable meeting with a presentation on wellness in the workplace, which was a catalyst for an in-depth discussion on how the industry is currently supporting its employees.
  • The Collections and Recoveries Roundtable shared best practices for becoming more digital in both communication strategies as well as in the income and expenditure process.

Our next set of meetings will be in March 2024. If you’d like to get involved, please reach out to us via roundtables@auriemma.group.

/by
, , ,

Streamlining the Growing Complaints Problem

(London, UK) Financial services customer complaint volumes are set to increase amid the uncertain macroeconomic environment and customers’ growing awareness of potential complaint payouts. According to Auriemma Group’s latest Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable, approximately one-third of members have already reported increases in the last three months. This, coupled with customers’ growing desire to complain via voice, will require firms to invest in their complaints management strategies.

“The increase in complaints volume is a real threat to operational efficiency – quick wins will be hard to come by,” says Louis Stevens, Director of Industry Roundtables. “This will likely lead to increased call volumes, the need for further headcount, longer resolving timeframes, higher redress values, and a heightened reputational risk.”

Although customers are showing a growing preference to self-serve for most transaction types, Auriemma’s research found that filing a complaint is one of the few areas where preference for voice chat is growing (i.e., 30% of respondents preferring voice in Q2-23 up from 22% in Q2-21). However, while some consumers may prefer voice chat, the channel is more costly to service and can often be less efficient. Streamlining this channel is crucial for success.

“We’ve heard some great examples of how firms are tackling these trends in our roundtable network,” says Stevens. “Some are empowering front-line agents to resolve at the first point of contact, others are increasing the number of SMS updates they send customers to reduce repeat contact, and a few have implemented a front-line phone team to deescalate and categorise complaints, all of which have already led to noticeable efficiencies.”

Looking ahead, roundtable members have indicated an intention to improve their root-cause analysis processes, as they believe this can help mitigate these predicted volumes and help them to better serve customers.

This along with a wide variety of other complaints-focused topics are already on the agenda for the upcoming Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable meeting on the 15th and 16th of November in Birmingham. If you or any of your colleagues are interested in attending as our guests, please contact us via roundtables@auriemma.group.

Survey Methodology

Cardbeat UK

This Auriemma Research study was conducted online within the UK by an independent field service provider on behalf of Auriemma in July 2023, among 80o+ adult credit cardholders. The number of interviews completed on a monthly basis is sufficient to allow for statistical significance testing between sub-groups at the 95% confidence level ± 5%, unless otherwise noted. The purpose of the research was not disclosed nor did the respondents know the criteria for qualification.

About Auriemma Group

For nearly 40 years, Auriemma’s mission has been to empower clients with authoritative data and actionable insights. Our team comprises recognized experts in four primary areas: operational effectiveness, consumer research, co-brand partnerships, and corporate finance. Our business intelligence and advisory services give clients access to the data, expertise and tools they need to navigate an increasingly complex environment and maximize their performance. Auriemma serves the consumer financial services ecosystem from our offices in New York City and London. For more information, visit us at www.auriemma.group or contact Louis Stevens at louis.stevens@auriemma.group.

/by
, , ,

Announcing our Autumn 2023 Roundtable Schedule

Our autumn set of roundtable meetings are taking shape, and we would welcome you and your team to join us as our guest.

The dates for the upcoming meetings are:

  • Fraud Control Roundtable – 2nd and 3rd November – Manchester
  • Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable – 15th and 16th November – Birmingham
  • Collections and Recoveries Roundtable – 23rd and 24th November – Birmingham

Roundtable meetings provide a unique environment for the industry to openly discuss challenges, concerns, best practices, learnings and more, whilst networking amongst peers.

Agendas are entirely sourced from those who attend and prioritised accordingly, so you can be sure that the subjects currently pertinent to you are covered.

If you or your colleagues are interested in joining for any of the above sessions, please contact nicole.toussaint@auriemma.group.

/by
, , ,

Operational Areas Transforming Under the New Consumer Duty

(London, UK) The Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA’s) New Consumer Duty went into full effect on the 31st of July 2023. Auriemma  Industry Roundtable members have been eager to collaborate with one another on how the regulation could affect each operational area and on what changes they are prioritising. At each meeting this year, roundtable members shared department-specific plans for tackling Consumer Duty as well as greater, overall objectives.

Collections and Recoveries Roundtable members are aligned in their focus on ensuring their forbearance toolkits are fit for purpose – with 23% of members introducing new forbearance options for struggling customers. Additionally, 54% of members indicated an intent to make changes to their supplier-oversight strategies—another focus area of the regulation.

“Our Customer Service members are hyper focused on communication structure and readability,” says Louis Stevens, Auriemma Industry Roundtables Director, “They are reviewing their entire communications catalogue and leveraging external partners to ensure verbiage meets the average UK reading and numerology levels.” To further ensure comprehension, many are also utilising customer research groups.

Complaints and Disputes departments alike are improving the customer experience around submitting a complaint/claim. They have increased the number of touchpoints to keep customers updated on the progress of their claim, with 15% of roundtable members intending to introduce text message updates as part of their journeys. As with Customer Service teams, 46% also intends to change their communication content, especially with complaints.

Fraud Control Roundtable members are pivoting to track more outcomes-based metrics and building new reporting structures around them. Many members have also recognised the need for Fraud Departments to become more involved in the vulnerable customer journey given that vulnerable customers are often targeted victims of fraud.

When looking at Operations as a whole, roundtable members have common themes within their plans. At the recent Auriemma Consumer Duty Workshop, 92% of members indicated they intend to run new training plans under Consumer Duty with the goal of building awareness amongst the department and delivering pinpointed training on how the regulation will affect individual roles. Outcome testing is a primary focus for many with 70% of firms already having had outcome testing frameworks in place, and the remaining 30% having planned to implement it in the months leading up to the deadline.

“Although it is crucial that the industry makes specific changes to comply with the New Consumer Duty, we must not forget that the intention of this regulation is to trigger a cultural change not just act as a tick-box exercise,” says Stevens. “This is not just a cultural change at the company level either, but rather across the industry as a whole. Collaboration amongst firms is crucial not only to comply with the regulation but to ensure the best possible outcomes for customers.”

To assist in this change, Auriemma is excited to announce its newly launched Regulatory Compliance Roundtable, with the pilot meeting specifically covering Consumer Duty. The agenda will be participant-led but will likely cover early learnings post the go-live date, planned future changes, internal governance structures, third-party oversight models, MI & reporting usage and more.

“We’re really excited for this new group and the enthusiasm we’re already seeing behind it,” says Stevens. “We hope that the group can become an extension of firms’ Consumer Duty teams and help shape the future of how this regulation is successfully implemented within the industry.”

The meeting is scheduled for the 18th of October at the St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel in London. If you or any of your colleagues are interested in attending as our guests, please contact us via roundtables@auriemma.group.

About Auriemma Group

For more than 35 years, Auriemma’s mission has been to empower clients with authoritative data and actionable insights. Our team comprises recognised experts in four primary areas: operational effectiveness, consumer research, co-brand partnerships and corporate finance. Our business intelligence and advisory services give clients access to the data, expertise and tools they need to navigate an increasingly complex environment and maximise their performance. Auriemma serves the consumer financial services ecosystem from our offices in London and New York City. For more information, visit us at www.auriemma.group or contact Louis Stevens at louis.stevens@auriemma.group.

/by
, ,

Dr. Stephanie Fitzgerald Visits UK Roundtables to Discuss Burnout

On the 7th of July we had the pleasure of having Dr. Stephanie Fitzgerald join us at the Collections and Recoveries Roundtable meeting in London to discuss best practices for preventing and managing burnout.

Since the pandemic, burnout has become particularly challenging for Collections front-line agents given the challenging conversations they have whilst working from home. Dr. Fitzgerald provided the group with practical techniques to use on their own teams to prevent burnout and build a healthier working culture.

Dr. Fitzgerald will also be joining us at the upcoming Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable meeting on the 15th and 16th of November in Birmingham. If you are interested in joining for the event, please reach out to roundtables@auriemma.group, or you can purchase a copy of her upcoming book “Reworked” on Amazon.

/by
, , ,

3 Ways Banks Are Implementing Hybrid Working Models

(London, UK) Widespread work-from-home started as an adaptation to COVID-19 but is here to stay. In Auriemma Group’s recent roundtable meetings financial institutions discussed long-term working models, all of which include some element of working from home. Their next challenge is developing a hybrid engagement model for their hybrid workforce.

Some have already taken then leap, and since implementing these hybrid models, Auriemma’s roundtable members received employee feedback that some feel less engaged and connected with the company. This, in conjunction with high attrition rates and challenging recruitment, means engagement strategies have become an area of focus.

Those who feel they have developed strong hybrid engagement models have focused on three areas: intentional scheduling, variety of choices and well-being considerations.

Intentional Scheduling

Firms strategically schedule location-appropriate activities when employees are onsite or working remotely. When onsite, firms try to have full teams concurrently present to build comradery and schedule more team-building activities like catered lunches and happy hours. When remote, roundtable members manage engagement via gamification and weekly competitions like step counts and quizzes.

“When managing a hybrid workforce, it is crucial that firms give equal treatment to employees regardless of on-or-offsite work,” says Louis Stevens, Director of Roundtables at Auriemma Group. “Otherwise, this can create a divide in the workforce and even lead to further attrition. Engagement models must cater to both demographics.”

Variety of Choices

Workforces are composed of a diverse mix of people with a diverse set of interests, which can make it challenging to find engagement activities that appeal to everyone. The solution? Including variety in the engagement offerings.

According to members, offerings should cater to both extroverts and introverts alike. One firm developed a successful monthly engagement programme for its employees, which allowed them to choose from a variety of activities like cocktail making classes and sporting events.

Well-Being Considerations

As part of their engagement strategies, financial institutions have incorporated well-being initiatives to protect the mental health of their employees. Initiatives vary from providing access to therapists to scheduling inspirational speakers and allotting weekly personal time in schedules.

30% of Auriemma Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable members have intentionally increased off-phone time for front-line agents since the start of the pandemic as a means of dedicating more time to employee well-being. Employees have the choice to use this time as they wish whether that be for professional development or something like meditation or yoga. Since implementing, firms have seen an improvement in productivity levels.

Auriemma’s roundtable members are still developing their engagement strategies. New developments and learnings will be discussed in depth at the upcoming Collections and Recoveries Roundtable meeting on the 9th and 10th of June in Edinburgh, as well at the Customer Service and Complaints Roundtable meeting on the 16th and 17th of June, also in Edinburgh.

About Auriemma Group

For more than 35 years, Auriemma’s mission has been to empower clients with authoritative data and actionable insights. Our team comprises recognised experts in four primary areas: operational effectiveness, consumer research, co-brand partnerships and corporate finance. Our business intelligence and advisory services give clients access to the data, expertise and tools they need to navigate an increasingly complex environment and maximise their performance. Auriemma serves the consumer financial services ecosystem from our offices in London and New York City. For more information, visit us at www.auriemma.group or call Louis Stevens at +44 (0) 207 629 0075.

/by
© Copyright - Auriemma Group