In 2021, lockdown after lockdown stacks on top of an already strong trend for businesses and their customers to talk to each other online.
Social media is accessible – and accessed – on a daily basis by financial services consumers.
Yet, for banks, insurance companies and investment advisors, embracing social media as a way to connect to customers is a double-edged sword.
People see social media as a direct, easy way to contact an otherwise ‘faceless’ organisation. As a result, more customer feedback is being lodged on social media, including complaints.
How ASIC’s RG 271 affects the way you handle consumer complaints
From 5 October 2021 ASIC’s RG 271 is in play. This regulatory guide applies to “Australian financial services (AFS) licensees, unlicensed product issuers, unlicensed secondary sellers, trustees of regulated superannuation funds (other than self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs)), trustees of approved deposit funds, retirement savings account providers, Australian credit licensees (credit licensees) and unlicensed carried over instrument lenders (unlicensed COI lenders).” (RG 271 on the ASIC website)
RG 271 updates ASIC’s requirements for how you manage complaints from customers about products, services, staff and even complaints about your organisation’s approach to complaint handling.
The updated guide reflects the findings of ASIC’s on-site supervisory ‘Close and Continuous Monitoring’ and other programs initiated after the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry. It includes the following changes:
- The definition of ‘complaint’ has broadened to mean an expression of ‘dissatisfaction made to or about an organisation, related to its products, services, staff or the handling of a complaint, where a response or resolution is explicitly or implicitly expected or legally required.’
- Banks and other financial institutions must respond to complaints more quickly.
- Regulated superannuation funds must provide information to consumers to allow them to understand the outcomes of their complaint and decide whether to escalate their complaint.
- The guidelines place more focus on ensuring your organisation identifies, investigates and resolves possible systemic issues raised by complaints.
✨✨ Download our Essential Guide to RG 271 now and find out how to track, analyse and respond to customer complaints faster with the help of Brolly ✅
ASIC expects approximately 821,730 complaints will need to be responded to more quickly across the finance sector, according to data from previous years. Handling consumer complaints will take more time and resources than before.
Here are 3 ways an automated archive of your social media channels can be an essential tool for your organisation
1. Your one source of truth
A complete record of complaints received on social media
When you welcome feedback and constructive criticism you are demonstrating your commitment to great customer service and continuous improvement of the products and service that you offer.
Social media can bring out strong language and emotions. If your customers are using social media to lodge complaints, you may need to manage comments on your public feed by hiding or deleting them.
Meanwhile, a Brolly social media archive captures every post, comment, deletion and edit in your organisation’s social media, even those items that are no longer visible to the public.
How a complete record helps you comply with RG 271
With RG 271’s broadened definition of complaint the demands on your social media team to monitor and manage your social media channels for ‘expressions of dissatisfaction’ will increase. A social media archive that automatically captures conversations in real time, reduces the load significantly, completely removing the need to manually assess and capture records that might fall under the definition of complaint.
2. Time is of the essence
Fast, accurate search and browse of your complete archive
All of your captured records are displayed in the feed, consolidated in a single view so you can see Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube records in one place. In the feed you can also search and filter to find specific records that meet the criteria.
How fast, accurate search and browse help you comply with RG 271
If your team needs to find a complaint that’s been lodged on social media and initiate your organisation’s internal dispute resolution (IDR) process, a social media archive is the only way you meet the reduced timeframes required by RG 271.
And even if a post or comment is deleted from Facebook and doesn’t appear on your Facebook page any more, you can be confident that it is captured in your archive along with metadata, links, attachments and context.
3. The cost of non-compliance
Non-compliance has consequences.
The standards and requirements highlighted in RG 271 are enforceable.
The aim of RG 271 is to help organisations improve the outcomes for consumers. ASIC has the power to legally enforce sections of RG 271, through civil action. It’s easy to avoid the financial and reputational toll of a civil action brought by ASIC: take complaints on social media seriously, with the right tools and systems in place.
Why Brolly?
Brolly is the only 100% Australian owned and operated social media archive, which means your precious conversations are housed in data servers that come under Australian law. An intuitive interface, Brolly is your key to one-click compliance and all the added benefits of having your records presented in a consolidated, searchable feed and available to export in multiple formats.