Bank deafaulters' harassment "out of control"

Customers who have defaulted on loan payments, irrespective of the amount and the period of delay, are complaining of constant harrassment by UAE banks.

Even customers with good credit histories and small amounts of repayment obligations are intimidated by regular calls, short message services (SMS) and phone calls automatically generated by the banks’ software systems.

Even customers who have repaid their obligations and closed their accounts get these automated calls.

Surprisingly, bank managers are saying systems are in place that are beyond their control.

Bank managers who spoke to 'Emirates24|7' admitted that they are unable to stop such calls and SMSs which are automatically generated by software that the banks have been using to track down willful and potential defaulters.

The loan servicing software that banks use does not distinguish between a willful defaulter and a customer who has a small repayment obligation.

Bank managers say these collection services are mainly outsourced and many agents from the same entity may be calling up the same customer.

Automated loan management software is used by most of the banks in the UAE.

Says an aggrieved customer of Emirates NBD: “I am annoyed by SMSs and phone calls that I get  every few hours from the bank, even after I  have discussed the matter with the concerned bank officials to settle the payment.

“As per the bank’s message, I approached the nearest branch and assured the loan manager about my payment schedule. I have just one month’s loan installment pending which was overdue for a few days as I was away from Dubai.”

“I had taken a loan of Dh200,000 and have been regularly repaying it for the last three-and-a -half years. I have already repaid Dh140,000 and due to unavoidable circumstances, I went to my home country and could not keep sufficient balance in my account.

“When I returned from vacation, I started receiving five to six phone calls a day, SMSs and even personal calls from collection agents,” he added.

“This happened even after I met the concerned official in the nearest branch of the bank, as advised by one such SMS, and told him to take my overdue installment from the next month’s salary, which is going regularly to  the same bank.”

“There is no problem, the bank will cut your due installment from your next  month’s  salary,” the manager had assured.

“We will block your salary account if you don’t make the payment within 24 hours,” threatened the bank’s collection staff.

This is in addition to at least ten pre-recorded messages and SMSs that I receive even at odd hours, reminding me that I am a big defaulter.

“Our investigation has revealed that there was a payment default on October 1, 2011. The call received by you are due to this default. This call will stop once the payment is received in your account and your account is normalised. We apologise for the inconvenience caused,” wrote the quality service manager of the bank.

However, the bank officials assured the customer that the threatening calls from the bank’s employees will stop now and that they have no control over the automated calls generated by the special software that the bank is using.

“These phone calls and SMSs are sent by robots after the system generates an automatic file if a loan installment is in default.

The system automatically creates a file of the defaulter and uses various methods - automatic phone calls and SMS messages to the customer’s  mobile phones. We hope nobody will call and threaten you personally. We don’t have any control on the phone calls and SMS that the system is generating automatically,” the manager admitted to this reporter.

“I had a credit card payment delay for Dh200 and I informed the foreign bank that I will make the payment at a particular time. Even after making the payment, I continued to receive threatening messages and phone calls from the bank’s collection department.  For just Dh400 that I have already paid,” said Joseph, who has a credit card account with a leading foreign bank in the UAE.

“The bank officials told me to ignore the calls and not make the payment as the calls are automatically generated.

“However, it is annoying as the calls are threatening customers who have already paid.They are saying these are  system- generated calls, but there should be human control over the system. The system, which was updated with my repayments, kept sending me these messages,” he added.

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.