Just within a few months, there was another relevant individual (RI) of Hang Seng Bank penalized by the regulator. Last time Ms Chu Lai Kwan was suspended by HKMA for concealing her personal account dealing. This time SFC banned Ms Hung Sum Yee, who should have already been deregistered as a RI, from re-entering the industry for five months.
The case of Ms Hung was a bit more complicated. First, she engaged in joint securities trading activities with another colleague (I wonder if this "another colleague" was Ms Chu) without disclosing the trading to Hang Seng. Second, HKMA found that Hung had accepted and mishandled investment order forms and time deposit forms that were signed by clients but were otherwise left blank.
As far as I know, signing blank forms by the clients is not uncommon in many banks. This arises from the clients' expectation that the bank officers could handle their investment orders with exercise of discretion. For example, the clients wish the bank officers could decide on their behalf the best timing of acquiring securities (shares or funds) and then making the disposal for either profit-taking or stop-loss. Some clients even rely on the bank officers to choose the "right" securities.
Unfortunately, banks' general policy is providing no discretionary account service at retail level. If the bank officers accepted clients' request for such service unofficially, they will violate SFC Code of Conduct. On the other hand, if they failed to exercise the discretion on behalf of clients subsequently, they would be complained for negligence or lack of diligence. So my advice to bank officers at retail level is: never pretending to be a nice guy!
To retain customers, it is hard for retail bank employees not to be a nice guy.
ReplyDeleteRetail banking is a more personalised service and employees have day to day contact with the customers. People enjoy chatting and being recognised as a regular customer.
In fact unofficially giving some valued customers privilage does secure their patronage. This is inevitable if the customers are regular to the extent that he comes to your branch and chat and asks for services almost every day and for a lengthy period (5 years, 10 years).