Top Five Insights: How Consumers Interact With Financial Firms by Phone

When it comes to safeguarding their finances, consumers have much higher expectations of banks, credit unions and other financial providers than other businesses. That’s especially true when it comes to fraud. According to MX News, “Customers need to be able to trust financial institutions and FinTechs to keep their money safe, to protect their personal data, and to deliver reliable services that help them manage and use their money responsibly. However, trust in financial services is hard won and fragile.”

We surveyed consumers to learn how they used the phone channel. We looked explicitly at issues that matter to financial institutions, a market segment inundated with imposter scams, call spoofing and cyber attacks on their systems, and a customer base losing trust in legitimate outreach methods like the phone.

Security Magazine reported financial institutions experienced a 53% year-over-year increase in fraudulent activity in Q4 2022. But smaller banks and credit unions are being hit the hardest; fraud rates in credit unions increased by over 70% during the same period. These smaller organizations lack the resources and technologies of larger institutions and often depend on personal customer relationships and phone interactions, leaving them vulnerable to phone-based fraud schemes.

It’s a struggle for financial firms, certainly. But consumers are relying on those institutions to help keep them safe. In fact, according to MX News research, 84% of consumers expect their financial providers to proactively alert them when something looks suspicious. 

The results of our recent research highlight the importance of the phone channel to communicate with consumers — in general and regarding fraud. It also confirms consumer demand for cutting-edge technologies like branded calling with STIR/SHAKEN call authentication to help increase connections and restore trust while reducing fraud. Branded calling enables financial institutions to add name, logo, number and reason for the call to the mobile display, along with a checkmark indicating the call was verified and not spoofed. Following is a recap of survey findings.

How badly do finance customers want branded calling?

Among TransUnion survey respondents, 45% rely on national banks and 16% regional or national credit unions. A full 91% of consumers said it’s important financial institutions clearly identify who’s calling — with name, logo and reason for the call on mobile display. In fact, it’s so important, 38% would change financial firms to one that uses branded calling, and 47% said they’d switch to a financial firm that authenticates calls with STIR/SHAKEN to ensure they weren’t spoofed.

Following are five additional findings for financial institutions.

1. Consumers are tired of pushing buttons and want to talk to a real person

Close to 80% of consumers told us the phone channel is important when communicating with businesses. As suspected, the desire to speak with a human on the phone was particularly important to consumers when discussing personal, high-value, urgent or complex issues.

Results show consumers prefer the phone when making:

55% High-value decisions like investments, mortgages or car purchases

40% Complex decisions like estate planning or portfolio review

2. Fraud doesn’t just impact consumers — it also impacts financial firms

The threat of fraud is constant. Today, it seems every call requires due diligence as consumers are left wondering: Is this a scam; do I need to call my financial firm? Will I lose money? Rather than answer calls that don’t include rich content, including name, logo, reason for the call and a checkmark saying the call hasn’t been spoofed, consumers just don’t pick up. Here’s what they said they do instead:

80% Block calls from numbers they don’t know

74% Don’t answer calls from unknown numbers because they’re concerned they may be scams

70% Have NOT answered a call due to fraud concerns but later learned the call was legitimate

68% Don’t answer because they assume it’s a robocall or someone trying to sell something

64% Received at least one call in the past year where the caller seemed to be impersonating someone else or was NOT who they claimed to be

The end result of missed connections? According to MX’s latest survey of 1,000+ consumers, more than half of respondents have either opened a new bank account (23%) or considered switching to a new bank (28%) in the past six months. The top reason? They wanted better customer service.

The MX survey also showed more than half (58%) ranked the level of trust they feel regarding a provider as one of the most important factors in choosing a financial provider, followed by how securely they protect their personal financial data (53%). 

3. Branding calls with rich content has many downstream benefits

Fortunately, there’s a solution that benefits both financial institutions and consumers: branded calling that includes trust-building details like the name, logo, number and reason for the call.

Respondents in our consumer survey said they’d:

73% Be likely to answer calls from businesses if they displayed company name and logo

61% Be very likely to answer a call on their mobile phones when certain who’s calling

4. Adding context helps with the long game: customer retention

Getting consumers to answer calls is challenging for financial institutions, but the rewards are well worth it. Consumers in our survey reported speaking to a real person promoted a positive customer experience (CX).

In fact, 75% felt their CX with a business would improve if they could be certain calls they receive are from the businesses they expect them to be. Even more significantly, 72% said they’d remain a customer of businesses that verify their calls have not been spoofed and provide their names and logos on the mobile display.

5. Three critical features may be just what finance firms need to reassure customers

Financial institutions take note: Consumers know exactly what they want to see on their mobile displays:

87% Caller name

64% Verification that call hasn’t been spoofed.

61% Logo of caller

Download the eBook, The Call Conundrum, Five Survey Insights on Consumer Calling Behavior and the Benefits of Branded Calling and learn how TransUnion^® Branded Call Display (BCD) can help you promote your financial institution while protecting your customers and brand from phone fraud.