The online bank ING is pushing ahead and raising the allowances for credit balances on current and overnight accounts on July 1st.
(Photo: dpa)
“A banker is the sort of person who lends his umbrella when the sun is shining and wants it back the moment it starts raining.” Mark Twain’s quip isn’t entirely fair—yet it gets to the point.
ING Germany is the first large private customer bank to eliminate negative interest rates for almost its entire clientele. The rest of the industry dithers and hesitates. Only when the European Central Bank withdraws its negative deposit rate will people want to move.
Why actually? No other industry relies so much on customer satisfaction in its advertising. “We would like to have your worries”, “We are the German bank at your side”. Each of us knows the slogans of the institutes.
Customer service has declined severely in recent years. From 2004 to 2019, the number of bank branches fell from 47,835 to 28,384. That means: More than four out of ten contact points have disappeared within 15 years. That inevitably means less service.
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The numbers seem abstract at first. But anyone can try changing a 500 euro note at a bank in Berlin, for example. Sometimes in a large branch you will be told that you don’t have a safe and therefore no more cash.
A bank without money is like a butcher without cutlets, like a wall without mortar. If an attempt is then also made to sell an 82-year-old woman a home savings contract, then one wonders whether the banks really stand by their customers’ side. These are certainly all isolated cases, but many a person may have experienced something similar in terms of customer satisfaction.
However, the immediate elimination of negative interest rates would also send an important financial policy signal in these turbulent times of inflation and war. The banking system is the bloodstream of the economy.
Taxpayers deserve relief
That is why there is such a force behind it when ING Germany abolishes the penalty interest – even if you are not a customer of this institute. The message from this decision is that monetary policy will soon be on the right track again.
>>> Read here: ING is the first major retail bank to say goodbye to negative interest rates
Of course, the abolition of negative interest on account balances would initially be expensive for the banks. Nevertheless, the President of the Banking Association and Deutsche Bank CEO, Christian Sewing, and the entire industry should remember the promises made by Angela Merkel and Peer Steinbrück during the 2008 financial crisis.
At that time, the chancellor and finance minister guaranteed the savings. That supported the banks. The taxpayers would have paid for it. Now it would be time to return the favor.
More: ECB boss Lagarde prepares markets for rate hike in July