New Nedbank platform grieves clients

Nedbank Namibia’s new operating platform has drawn criticism from some clients who have lambasted the new platform called Flexcube.

The shift in operating platform will in future enable Nedbank clients to use mobile cellular devices for banking services and enhances the online banking experience, Nedbank claims.
Responding to a query by the Economist, Senior Manager for Marketing and Communications, Gernot de Klerk said, “Nedbank Namibia has embarked on an extensive upgrade of our core banking platform, aimed at introducing greater agility as far as our inherent banking practices are concerned. The migration to Flexcube by Oracle was implemented with a solid measure of success two weeks ago, which was underscored by our ability to be of service to our clients immediately upon concluding the switch-over.”
According to de Klerk, Nedbank Namibia has turned the tide on its problematic operating system and said that Nedbank branches throughout the country were fully operational in terms of taking deposits, clearing and settling payment files with other parties and dealing decisively with client queries in-branch.
“We have experienced some initial client frustration resultant from the number of concurrent users on our Internet Banking platform and the matter was addressed conclusively by the middle of last week,” de Klerk assured the Economist.
Nedbank client Irina Ivanova is however of a different opinion and said that she was let down by the new operating platform, “Nedbank Namibia recently switched to a new online banking system which resulted in us being left without bank services for some days. We can not login into the new system, we can [therefore] not make payments. We can see no references for payments transferred into our account and Nedbank does not supply it despite our numerous requests. In short Nedbank’s new system, [which] we have not asked for, severely disrupted our business and inconvenienced us. Needless to say that Nedbank offered no support and we have had no reaction to our requests. We do, however, have promises from Nedbank.”
De Klerk acknowledged some of Ivanova’s claims. According to de Klerk, improved security features have made the login process cumbersome. “From client feedback received to date, it is evident that the log-on processes were deemed to be cumbersome and time-consuming. By and large, this is ascribed to new and improved security features, which also require clients to change their old password after logging on for the first time.”
De Klerk advised clients to seek counsel with Nedbank. “We advise any of our clients who may still have difficulties with the electronic banking process to kindly get in touch with our Call Centre or their branch or Relationship Manager for additional advisory support.” Dr. Andreas Mwoombola, Head: Transformation & Strategy also stated that glitches like this are expected when a company upgrades to a new system and that customers should bear with them, because they are dealing with the issue.
According to de Klerk, Nedbank was in the process of installing Internet Banking kiosks at all its branches countrywide, while additional teams and resources have been dedicated to enhance advisory services capacity in aid of resolving client queries.