NAB pays $6.5m to customers of bad advice

In a statement yesterday, NAB said its ‘Customer Response Initiative’ has seen $6.5 million paid to 251 customers – up from $1.7 million paid to 87 customers a year ago. 

The bank added it is continuing to write to groups of customers who may have received inappropriate advice since 2009.

Andrew Hagger, NAB chief customer officer, consumer banking and wealth management, said, “We’re committed to helping restore customer trust and confidence in the financial planning industry.

“As part of this, last year we made a number of public commitments to strengthen our business and improve our transparency and openness. I’m pleased that we are continuing to meet those commitments.”

One of those commitments includes advising ASIC of all advisers who leave NAB, along with the categorisations of and reasons for their departure.

“In addition to our reporting obligations for the ASIC financial adviser register, we have implemented a process to notify ASIC in writing of any adviser departure where we have had compliance concerns about that adviser,” said Mr Hagger.

Further, the bank committed last year to adding independence to its complaints and whistleblower process. Today, NAB said it has introduced six different measures to support the initiative.

Those include appointing an independent officer to sit on its whistleblower committee, appointing Deloitte to review and report on its Customer Response Initiative progress, and offering customers $5,000 to source their own independent financial advice if they need help understanding the outcomes of the compensation scheme.

“Our focus is to do the right thing by our customers,” Mr Hagger said.

“We believe the way that we have structured our work has helped to deliver more money into more customers’ hands as quickly as possible.”