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The Bank of Lithuania has told the country's payment service providers (PSPs) to continue enhancing the user experience they provide.
This call to action follows a comprehensive assessment of more than 100 financial institutions operating within Lithuania, which found that although many institutions are making strides in this area, some still have significant room for improvement.
The evaluation by the Bank of Lithuania focused on how well financial market participants are meeting consumer expectations and adhering to observations and recommendations regarding user experience.
"Payment and other financial services are of the first necessity, so when providing them, financial institutions must ensure their quality and availability,” said Vaidas Cibas, director of the Financial Services Supervision Department of the Bank of Lithuania.
“Feedback is also necessary for this — financial institutions must constantly monitor and analyse customer behaviour, needs, expectations, properly assess complaints and take measures to solve the problems that caused them," Cibas continued.
The regulator did note that most financial institutions are working to strengthen their customer relationships, including by analysing customer needs, measuring user satisfaction indices, monitoring and responding to customer feedback (including social media comments), and involving employees in the process of analysing complaint trends.
In addition, when customer complaints appear to be systemic, many institutions' top management are engaged in seeking solutions.
Room for improvement
Despite the progress, the assessment identified a subset of financial institutions that respond to customer needs in a more perfunctory manner.
Some institutions, even after receiving complaints, seem reluctant to fully address them.
The Bank of Lithuania has deemed this approach inappropriate, urging these institutions to allocate adequate attention and resources to customer service and to adopt best practices in handling complaints and feedback.
The intervention follows a diktat from the central bank in 2022 in which the central bank urged financial institutions to enhance payment service quality by focusing on user experience, clear communication and effective complaint handling.
It encouraged institutions to tailor services to different customer groups, improve the clarity of legal requirements and actively respond to feedback.
Emphasising digital security and fraud prevention, the regulator also stressed regulatory compliance to foster a user-centric, accessible and inclusive financial services market in Lithuania.
