Bank of Kigali (BK) has joined the rest of the world to mark the ongoing International Customer Service Week.

The lender kicked off the customer care week with several members of its executive team putting aside their supervisory ranks to serve clients as tellers and receptionists.

Desire Rumanyika, Chief of Operating Officer and Flora Nsinga, the Chief Human Resources and Administration Officer are some of the six members of the executive management who were seen mingling with clients at the BK headquarters in Kigali.

The Executives told The New Times that the gesture was intended to put the management into the staff’s shoes but also an opportunity to reach out to their clients and hear their feedback.

"More often we put the staff on pressure to deliver the best service there is without full understanding of the possible challenges that might arise in their work on a daily basis,” Rumanyika said.

BK has about 80 branches across the country with 40 spread across the three districts that makeup the City of Kigali. It has about 1,500 employees.

"We also happen to have the biggest number of customers compared to other banks, so today we were inspired by the International Customer Service Week to also remind our staff the reason we are here. It is the reason we decided as the Executive to lead by example how we should treat our customers and it will be done through October 5. Our customers deserve the best service possible.” Rumanyika added.

While Rumanyika urges the customers to continue pushing for the best service, he also says that it is upon them to ensure that the staff has all the possible necessary facilitation to deliver best service to the clientele, "because the staff represent us what we do before our customers.”

Rose Ngabire, Head of Customer Experience at the Bank said that there are a number of activities the bank is engaging in, among them, was to bring the Executives to experience the staffs’ experience, appreciate our agents who serve our customers outside the traditional banking system. 

Chief Operating Officer Desire Rumanyika writes on the customer appreciation board in celebration  of customer service week.

Chief human resource and administration officer at BK Flora Nsinga and Head of customer experience management at BK Rose Ngabire (C) listen to a customer as the Bank celebrates the Customer Service Week. Photos by Nadege Imbabazi.

The customer service week will culminate on Friday with Bank’s CEO serving breakfast to its clients the Headquarter.

"From this experience they are going to find solution to issues like long queues and make some changes. May be to see how we can educate our customers to embrace our digital services more. We have many digital services but we see little transition towards that. We have to change the attitude,” Ngabire said.

She added; "But we also want them to hear from our customers. We want to learn from those mistakes and serve our customers better. This is all aimed at making sure that we appreciate our staff but also improve the service we give to our customers”.

Despite this Customer Service week, Ngabire says, BK conducts annual surveys to understand customer challenges and needs, which has continued to facilitate the institution to make decisions based on customer feedback.