“I’ve already thought about changing banks, maybe this will give me the boost I need,” says a long-time Laurentian Bank customer. Gilles Denis-Shargari, 72, still hadn’t paid his rent on Monday because he didn’t have access to his money.
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The pensioner is one of the financial institution’s 340,000 customers affected by the outage, which has affected its online services since September 24.
“They’re going to force me to write a check like I used to,” he laughs.
All joking aside, there are thousands of customers like him who haven’t had access to their bank accounts for at least five days.
“I came to the ticket office last week and there were 15 older people in line, all in their 80s. It was sad,” said another customer, Mario Orellala.
Mario Orellala has been a customer of Laurentian Bank for at least forty years. The retired CEGEP teacher considers himself lucky to have two accounts at two different banks. Photo Julien Mcevoy
This retired CEGEP teacher has other resources – he’s a customer at another bank – but he’s worried about those who don’t.
“I don’t think I will continue to use my Laurentian Bank account,” he says.
“Poorly managed”
This exodus of customers is the challenge that awaited Laurentian’s new CEO on his first day in office, Monday.
Eric Provost has been head of Laurentienne since Monday. His inauguration will focus on crisis management. Pierre-Paul Poulin / Le Journal de Montréal / Agence QMI
Quebecer Éric Provost, who has been with the bank for 11 years, agreed to replace CEO Rania Llewellyn, who left the company after a disastrous week.
“I can simply apologize to our customers. “This is unacceptable,” summarizes the new boss, who lives on the south coast of Montreal and will run the bank from the Quebec metropolis.
The collapse and its aftermath were “poorly managed” and the bank “could have communicated better with its customers,” he said in an interview with the Journal.
He immediately asked his teams to come to him with recommendations on how to compensate customers.
These “considerations” are in addition to the free bank fees for the month of September and the reimbursement of any costs incurred, such as an overdraft.
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QUB radio
:
On his first day of crisis management, Mr. Provost collected reassuring interviews.
The future of Banque Québécoise, Canada’s smallest bank, remains uncertain. Until recently it was for sale, at the moment it is no longer for sale, although it could be again.
“There is nothing final in the corporate world. “Our commercial area is very relevant, we have a role to play and we will focus on presenting our best practices,” assures the new boss.
Millions are at stake
The Quebecer is the company’s third CEO in three years. François Desjardins retired in 2020 at the age of 49 with a severance payment of $1.7 million.
Monolingual English-speaking Rania Llewellyn, who ran the bank from Toronto, arrived a few months later with a $3 million hiring bonus, including $700,000 in cash.
- Listen to Alexandre Dubé’s editorial on Benoit Dutrizac’s show via QUB radio :
Éric Provost yesterday refused to say what salary increase he would be entitled to in order to reach the highest position in the company. He also declined to say what compensation Ms. Llewellyn was entitled to.
“It is the board that decides on my predecessor and you have to wait for the company circular for my salary, it will be public,” he said.
The Laurentian Bank in brief
- Founded in Montreal in 1846
- Smallest Canadian bank
- 3000 employees
- 57 branches (all in Quebec)
- 340,000 customers (large majority in Quebec)
- Market cap: $1.3 billion ($166 billion for RBC)