Piaras Kelly PR - Public Relations in Ireland

Northern Rock’s reputation is on the rocks at the moment (excuse the pun) following problems in the credit markets caused by the subprime mortgage financial crisis. Conall McDevitt offers some good commentary on the recent news from a reputation management and public relations perspective.

What I have found interesting is the impact of Northern Rock’s financial woes on online banking in Ireland. The Sunday Tribune business section led with the headline ‘Is this the end of internet banking?‘ (The link to the article is broken which is a shame because it was an excellent read.) It was interesting that Greg McAweeney, general manager of internet bank RaboDirect offered the following comment in the article, “Being honest, it [Northern Rock's online problems] doesn’t help the reputation of internet banking, and it’s certainly been a wake-up call for the sector.” Slightly earlier that week, as a RaboDirect customer, I received the following email:

Dear Piaras,

In light of recent developments here are some facts about RaboDirect in Ireland, part of Rabobank Group, the safest and most secure bank in Ireland. We hope you will be reassured to know that:

RaboDirect.ie is part of the Rabobank Group which has a AAA-rating from the international rating agencies Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s and Dominion Bond Rating Service. This is the highest level of creditworthiness that a bank can attain and not many banks have this rating. Rabobank is the only AAA rated bank in Ireland.

Rabobank’s assets are larger than AIB and Bank of Ireland combined. Measured by its core capital, Rabobank is in fact one of the world’s top twenty largest financial institutions.

Rabobank is consistently voted the “World’s Safest Privately Owned Bank” by Global Finance Magazine in its annual survey.

As Europe’s largest online bank RaboDirect surpasses all other banks in Ireland in internet security. The levels of online security via our Digipass system lead the way in Ireland. And to back up our claims, we’re still the only bank to offer its customers a unique “No-Fraud Online Banking Guarantee”.

Rabobank is a cooperative bank and was founded in 1898 to provide finance to farmers. Since then it has grown to become one of the Netherlands largest financial institutions, has 60,000 employees and operates in 41 countries worldwide. As a cooperative bank you won’t see us traded on stock exchanges!

It’s good to know that your money is in the safest of hands. You can read more about Rabobank’s background and financial statements at http://www.rabobank.com/content/investor_relations.

As always, you can contact us on 1850 88 22 22 from Monday to Friday from 8am-8pm or by email at info@rabodirect.ie.

Yours sincerely,

Greg McAweeney
General Manager
RaboDirect.ie

It was an interesting move by RaboDirect, I was too caught up at work to pay attention to the hysteria building among Northern Bank customers, but it was obvious that there were knock-on effects for other online banks. With online banking still very much in its infancy in Ireland, the recent crisis will have done nothing to improve the reputation of organisations like RaboDirect.

There was a fantastic comment in the Sunday Tribune article which I thought I would highlight, “A senior official at a large Irish bank said this development had been noted: ‘What Northern Rock showed us is that it’s important to keep an eye on these discussion boards, and if there is uncertainty expressed by our customers then engage with them online. . . even just a general, honest message stating we are aware of whatever the problem is, like a malfunctioning website, reassures people that we’re trying to get it sorted, ‘ she said. ‘After all, a bank’s main intangible asset is trust.‘”

While trust in online banks may be wavering, from a communications perspective it is good to see RaboDirect taking positive steps to reassure their customers.

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