Mrs. Matilda Asante-Asiedu, Second Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG), has called for an industry-wide commitment to service excellence, innovation, and robust cybersecurity as cornerstones of Ghana’s modern banking landscape.
Speaking at a capacity-building workshop organised by the BoG’s Financial Stability Department, Mrs. Asante-Asiedu underscored the need for financial institutions to strengthen customer-centric practices, enhance operational efficiency, and adopt proactive measures against emerging digital risks.
“The fact that we’re here today, investing time and resources in this training, shows how critical service quality delivery is to the Central Bank,” she said.
“We could have simply issued directives and expected compliance, but we chose engagement because we believe in learning from each other and improving together,” she added.
The session drew participants from across Ghana’s financial sector, including representatives of the Ghana Association of Banks, PwC, and various consumer protection and compliance units.
To illustrate the real-world implications of service lapses, Mrs. Asante-Asiedu shared a personal experience from a recent trip to Spain, where a failed card transaction disrupted her shopping plans. She noted that such incidents, though seemingly minor, reflect broader systemic weaknesses that can affect thousands of customers.
“Even a two percent downtime may seem negligible on paper, but that could mean 10,000 customers affected by poor service,” she said, stressing that consistent reliability must remain a core goal for all financial institutions.
Held under the theme “Excellence in Service, Innovation in Delivery, Security in Practice,” the event emphasized the growing expectations of consumers for fairness, speed, and professionalism.
Mrs. Asante-Asiedu revealed that customer complaints received by the BoG increased by seven percent in 2024, from 695 to 743 cases, many of which could have been resolved at the institutional level with more care and collaboration.
She also raised concerns about rising fraud cases within Ghana’s financial system. In 2024 alone, over 16,700 fraud incidents were reported, leading to losses estimated at nearly GH₵100 million. Notably, 33 percent of these cases involved bank employees.
“This calls for greater vigilance, ethics, and discipline,” she warned. “Technology must not become a tool for vulnerability but a foundation for trust.”
Mrs. Asante-Asiedu encouraged banks to leverage the BoG’s regulatory sandbox to pilot innovative solutions safely and urged them to embed cybersecurity measures into every level of their operations. “No level of innovation or service quality will offset weak security,” she cautioned.
She reminded participants that service excellence and security are shared responsibilities. “It’s not just the work of compliance officers or IT departments, it begins at the board level and must be embraced throughout the organisation.”
Concluding her remarks, the Deputy Governor urged financial institutions to recommit to fairness, transparency, and customer care. “The strength of our banking system lies not just in profitability but in how we treat our customers,” she said.
In his opening remarks, Dr. Kwasi Osei-Yeboah, Head of the Financial Stability Department at the BoG, described the workshop as a platform for action, a space to strengthen service delivery, drive purposeful innovation, and reinforce trust through transparency and secure practices.
