Comment by dghlsakjg
5 days ago
"I won't continue to be your customer if you cannot provide the service I need" Is not "Karen behaviour".
Continuing to patronize a business that will not sell you a product you want is being a pushover. The flip side is if a business is in the custom of only providing certain services to those who threaten to leave, then they shouldn't be surprised when people threaten to leave in order to receive good service.
I suspect that you live in Canada, which has the banking oligopoly that leads to banks not giving a shit, and customers that are used to banks not trying. If more people were willing to take their money and walk, Canadian banking would probably suck less ass.
Canada has a lot of banks, including digital/virtual ones. All provinces also have at least one credit union to rival regular banks.
Just because there are juggernauts ("the big five/six") doesn't mean it's an oligopoly. This isn't like telecom where there are only 3 choices (4 in some provinces) and nobody else can enter the game because it costs too much.
An oligopoly is typically defined as when the majority of the market is captured by a few players leading to pricing control. It does not matter that there are dozens of other players, it is about who controls the market share and pricing power. In Canada 6 big banks have accounts for 85% of the population and control 93% of assets. Canadian Banking is frequently used as an example of a real world oligopoly.
The existence of Credit Unions and small banks that offer similar but limited service does not negate the pricing power of Canadian banks. E.g. in most other modern countries paying $17-$35/mo for a checking account is not normal. In Canada that is just what every major bank charges for a checking account.
its also worth highlighting that many of the "options" in Canada are just online only brands of the big 6.