Paul Jacobson

Life and its many opportunities

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@standardbankgrp is freaking me out a little

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I received a freaky call from Standard Bank a little earlier. I booked tickets for my family to Cape Town next week and the call I received was from the travel department at the bank (somewhere in the behemoth that is my bank) clarifying whether our tickets are for local flights or international. I’m not sure what the motive for the call was but it drove home how much information our banks have about us and our habits. We worry about social networks using our personal information but the profiles our banks probably develop must be very comprehensive and granular.

I imagine the call was part of an effort to market more specific services to customers based on their purchasing habits and while that may be valuable (I have just complained about indiscriminate and unsolicited marketing and something more focused is what I had in mind as an alternative), I’d like the bank to make more of an effort to let me know it is profiling me the way it may be doing and to what extent. I’d also like to know if/when I am going to receive calls like this.

  1. thomas avatar
    thomas

    Standard Bank did a similar thing we me once, but it was to let me know that I was covered for travel insurance on my international trip as I had booked the tickets with my credit card. I’m quite glad they did as it’s a credit card that I very rarely check and as it turned out my card had being fraudulently used to book international travel tickets.

    Reply
  2. Standard Bank Team avatar
    Standard Bank Team

    Hi Paul,

    It is likely that the call was to confirm that you bought the tickets and to activate the insurance that comes with your card. The consultant who called you should have explained the reason for the call and it is strange that they did not. In this instance we’d like to know what time you were contacted and if you were given any further info. Also, we can not contact you for marketing unless you have given your consent.

    Thanks,

    Standard Bank Team

    Reply
  3. pauljacobson avatar
    pauljacobson

    Hi

    It was probably a little before 4pm and I really didn’t get much at all from the caller. I thought she was trying to confirm my flight was local. I barely heard her and asked her to repeat herself.

    Reply

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