CANBERRA: ANZ has become the latest major bank to compensate clients for bad service and inappropriate advice.Australia’s third-biggest bank by market value will reimburse 8,500 clients who used its Prime Access fee-for-service package a total of approximately $30 million.
ANZ agreed to make the payout after confirming that some clients did not receive a documented annual review, which is part of a broader package which includes access to financial planners and investment monitoring alerts.The admission and apology comes as banking chiefs prepare to be grilled next Tuesday when the Senate Economic Committee examines bad banking behaviour.
Pressure has been growing for a Royal Commission into white collar crime after revelations of unlawful and unethical practices at the Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank and Macquarie Private Wealth.
NAB revealed in March that around 750 customers who received bad advice had been quietly compensated between $10 million and $15 million, with several financial planners sacked.
Both the CBA and Macquarie Private Wealth entered into enforceable undertakings after scandals in their financial planning arms.
In a statement, ANZ said it was working with the Australian Securities & Investments Commission (ASIC) to determine how the reimbursements will be made to clients.
The settlement does not carry an apology from ANZ’s high profile chief executive Mike Smith, but instead from the bank’s global wealth boss Joyce Phillips.”We sincerely apologise to our clients for not delivering all of the Prime Access services we promised and we will reimburse affected clients as soon as possible,” Ms Phillips said.
“We have also put in place a range of measures to ensure this issue does not happen again. This includes improved training, technology, audit and supervision, as well as including the documented annual review as an essential component of balanced scorecards for our financial planners.”
ANZ said it reported the issues to ASIC in accordance with the Corporations Act and sought external advice from the law firm Clayton Utz.While the audit of Prime Access clients goes back to 2003, the ANZ confirmed that annual reviews due since 2013 have been completed and delivered.
