First Direct - what are the numbers?

Archi_Bald

Like presumably many of you, I had an email from First Direct today, telling me that I am an incredible customer, and that I will be entered into a prize draw [for £500] if I log into my account between 22 and 31 July 2013. Yawn, I do log into my account once a day, anyway. Have done so since about 2003. Thank you very much for your tailored offers, First Direct.

But all that is by-the-by. The real meat is in the smallprint of that email.

They say:

From 4 September to 24 December 2012, 60% of 107 first direct current account customers had actually recommended their bank. Closest brand over the same time period had 42% of 280 current account customers recommend the bank. Source: Independent Survey.

60% of 107 is about 64, 42% of 280 is about 117. FD 'wins' on %age rate, but almost twice as many actual number of people recommend some other (unnamed) bank.

I am glad that I will be entered into the prize draw - - but I'd love to understand why 64 people recommending a given bank account is statistically relevant, and if it is, why 64 recommendations would be better than 117. Any ideas?

MoneySaverLog

Dammed lies and statistics can make anything look impressive. But when you look into them you realise how they are trying to pull a fast one.

FD are good but certainly not the be all of banking that they make out in my opinion.

TheEffect

I've heard a lot of people got this email, but I didn't for some reason.

Wondering if it's for specific customers...

100saving

TheEffect wrote: »

I've heard a lot of people got this email, but I didn't for some reason.

Wondering if it's for specific customers...

I never got this email either i wonder if you had to have the account for a set amount of time?

greenorange

100saving wrote: »

I never got this email either i wonder if you had to have the account for a set amount of time?

Possibly. I opened mine in 2009/2010. I'm probably not that profitable for them anyway.

Gromitt

100saving wrote: »

I never got this email either i wonder if you had to have the account for a set amount of time?

Never got the email, but I did get it when I logged in via secure messaging. I think my mail client has determined that 99% of email from First Direct is spam and automatically deletes it.

Had the account for about 15 years or so, but its only used for wages and the regular saver. All funds are transferred elsewhere on pay day

MoneySaverLog

No email either, don't think they like me though :-(

Archi_Bald

Any more opinions on this, please?

Archi_Bald wrote: »

I'd love to understand why 64 people recommending a given bank account is statistically relevant, and if it is, why 64 recommendations would be better than 117. Any ideas?

Caladan

I'm no statistician and am making wild assumptions here, but I presume if you consider the size of First Directs customer base to those of the major High street banks (which are almost certainly several magnitudes larger) the amount of customers surveyed may be reflective?

Not explaining this very well I think, what I mean is, say a company has 100 customers and 70 of them recommend it, but another company has 1000 customers and 500 recommend it, the smaller company still has a higher rate of satisfaction and recommendation than the larger company in terms of percentage of happy customers, even though the larger company has more people making recommendations.

Edit: I hasten to add I don't think the sample sizes used for this survey are reasonable - 107 people to judge a company that has tens of thousands of clients? No thanks. So yes, I agree it's manipulation, but hopefully my viewpoint on the actual way the statistics work helps the discussion.

Kind regards,
Cal

greenorange

Caladan wrote: »

I'm no statistician and am making wild assumptions here, but I presume if you consider the size of First Directs customer base to those of the major High street banks (which are almost certainly several magnitudes larger) the amount of customers surveyed may be reflective?

Not explaining this very well I think, what I mean is, say a company has 100 customers and 70 of them recommend it, but another company has 1000 customers and 500 recommend it, the smaller company still has a higher rate of satisfaction and recommendation than the larger company in terms of percentage of happy customers, even though the larger company has more people making recommendations.

Edit: I hasten to add I don't think the sample sizes used for this survey are reasonable - 107 people to judge a company that has tens of thousands of clients? No thanks. So yes, I agree it's manipulation, but hopefully my viewpoint on the actual way the statistics work helps the discussion.

Kind regards,
Cal

I'd imagine first direct has millions, rather than tens of thousands.

matttye

107*2.61682243 = 280.00000001

64*2.61682243 = 167.47663552

117/167.47663552*100 = 69.8604910689

So First Direct has a 30.14% (ish) better satisfaction rate.

That's the closest I can get to the exact figures.