Optimizing the Customer Experience in the Face of a Branch Consolidation

By Laura DeLaCruz, Director of Project Management and Business Development

It’s a funny thing being a creative marketing and communications agency: our clients hire us for our ideas. As fun as it is to be creative, it can be a lot of pressure to know that the bills only get paid when the ideas are good. After all, creativity flows most freely when the livin’ is easy! So, how do we keep the creative juices flowing despite the challenge of having to be creative on demand?

In planning customer communications for a bank merger, you’ll need to focus on the strategies that ensure a smooth transition of your newly acquired clients to their new accounts and services. The same holds true when it’s a systems conversion impacting your own customers.

Once customers have migrated to their new accounts and their first statements have arrived, that’s when additional communications may matter most in the long-term.

First announced in 2017, the phaseout of LIBOR (London Interbank Offered Rate) as a global interest rate benchmark for interbank lending will be completed by the end of 2021. In addition, many banks also use LIBOR as a reference rate for adjustable rate commercial and consumer loans. The United States Federal Reserve has recommended SOFR (Secured Overnight Financing Rate) as a replacement.

As you may know, LIBOR (London Interbank Offered Rate) is a global interest rate benchmark that banks use to lend to each other. Many banks also use LIBOR as a reference rate for commercial and consumer loans that carry an adjustable rate. As a result of some global scandals related to LIBOR rate manipulation, it will be phased out by the end of 2021.