The Customer Owned Banking Code Compliance Committee has issued a best practice note, recommending that phone recording should be used wherever possible to avoid misunderstandings about complaints and feedback.

COBCCC’s recommendation was prompted by a recent investigation, in which a customer complained that her privacy was breached. After completing what she assumed was anonymous feedback she received a call from a staff member who wanted to take issue with her comments.

The customer took the matter to the Australian Financial Complaints Authority and also COBCCC because of a possible code breach.

COBCCC found that there was no privacy breach because the customer had provided her name and contact details while doing the survey and consented to the terms of the survey, which allowed for the customer to be contacted to discuss her feedback.

However, COBCC said best practice would be to record such interactions.

“If call recordings are available in your office, use them for all phone responses to complaints and feedback. This valuable tool helps assess professionalism, achieve regulatory compliance, ensure high quality customer service, enhance employee training and productivity, and resolve customer complaints,” it said.

It also recommended that staff be very clear about how survey responses and feedback would be used and that the person responsible for internal dispute resolution is impartial and in a separate area from the issue complained about.