A Fresh Look at Compliance: CX Friend or CX Foe?

Compliance is often framed as a necessary evil and barrier to customer experience (CX) programs — a cost center rather than a value-add — and one which can divert resources away from core business activities.

This presents a contrast for financial services businesses. Compliance is not optional, especially as we’ve seen a sharp increase in regulation in recent years, but given that those brands leading in customer experience management are three times more likely to exceed their business goals, neither is CX. 

According to Adobe, almost a quarter of brands rank CX as their most exciting priority this year but a gap exists between ambition and capability. Only 5% of UK brands describe their CX development as “very advanced.”

Where should organizations’ resources be prioritized? CX and compliance are not mutually exclusive and if approached in a cohesive, consistent manner, they can complement each other to deliver best practices across the entire organization.

Arguably, they should complement each other as, driven in part by PPI and GDPR in the UK, customers are savvier than ever and eager for reassurance that compliance is being adhered to as part of their engagement with businesses.

A Modern Approach

Achieving this level of cohesion and consistency is hugely challenging, if not impossible, for organizations working with disparate or manual systems. A lack of integration can impede a comprehensive view of the customer, especially given how many different channels consumers now use to interact with businesses. Having pockets of data across a plethora of systems isn’t particularly conducive to effective compliance. Instead, it generates a more convoluted, resource-intensive process and potentially incurs unnecessary costs.    

The new breed of modern complaints and case management systems like Aptean Respond are designed to solve this issue by helping financial services firms capture every detail from every interaction, irrespective of the channel they take place on, in a centralized platform. Whether a query comes in via a website, a social channel, a contact center or branch, the detail is logged and the original record updated. This leaves a footprint from which to cross-check with regulatory rules and leverage for cross-selling as appropriate.

A Converged Future

Such solutions represent a win-win for teams. They simultaneously provide a robust platform for CX management — optimizing interactions, providing a single view of the customer and facilitating vital feedback to shape CX strategy — while delivering the transparency necessary for rigorous compliance. They are set up to manage all regulatory rights requests efficiently as well as containing dedicated templates and embedded, customizable reporting tools to maintain compliance with all current regulation in a simple click.

The level of resource required to maintain complaints management systems is reduced substantially by ensuring that compliance requirements are built into everyday processes and procedures, freeing up valuable resources to focus on CX strategy.

Traditionally, customer experience management and compliance would rarely be put in the same vein, but a modern approach recognizes the valuable and vital relationship between the two. Given accelerating consumer expectations and regulatory requirements, it’s abundantly clear that success comes from having a holistic view of the organization, a customer-centric culture and the digital capabilities to facilitate. Those enterprises who embrace the benefits of a consistent, converged approach stand to be the market leaders of tomorrow.

Are you ready to embrace compliance and customer experience? Contact us today to find out how Aptean’s complaints management system can help you manage both with ease.