SG banks, insurers customer experience quality unimproved in 2024

It's become difficult to distinguish leaders from laggards as the gap has narrowed.

Singaporean financial institutions’ customer experience (CX) quality remained flat for the fifth consecutive year, indicating a lack of competitive differentiation amongst banking brands in the city.

The average CX quality of financial services brands is stuck in the “OK” category for 5 years, according to the Singapore Customer Experience Index (CX Index) study by research and advisory company Forrester.

The banking industry averaged a CX score of 61.3, no changes from the previous year. There has been no statistically meaningful movement observed since 2022, said Tom Mouhsian, Forrester principal analyst.

HSBC earned the top CX score amongst banks (65.4) and the investment industry (66.1), receiving top ratings in metrics related to customer loyalty, satisfaction, forgiveness, and brand alignment with customer values. 

But the competitive gap has become narrower and the score concentration higher, making it more difficult to distinguish leaders from laggards, Mouhsian said.

“In addition, year on year CX score differences for brands included in the index are mostly statistically insignificant, showing no real change. This forms an overall disappointing trend for CX in Singapore in 2024,” he said.

To improve their customer experience, Mouhsian said that financial services brands must focus on the drivers that have the greatest impact on their CX quality. 

For banks, these drivers include resolving problems quickly and providing easy-to-use mobile banking apps. 
CX quality in the auto and home insurance sectors is driven by factors such as making it easier to get an appointment with an agent and being more transparent about policy costs. 

Amongst insurers, Singlife performed the best, receiving the highest share of “excellent” customer experience ratings, Forrester said.
Singlife also led in customer forgiveness and brand alignment metrics.