Abstract

Clientele Structure Effects of Charges in the Private Giro Business of the Banks

The article deals with customer reactions to bank charge policy decisions in the private giro business of the banks, that is onlv the reaction of switching banks. In private giro business, an explanation is sought for the bank selection behaviour of customers who demand an array of services. The author proceeds from the realistic assumption that customers judge the cheapness of banks on the basis of the total price burden for the array of services which they will presumably call for. In the literature the thesis is supported that “small customers” may be deterred by basic charges and to that extent a clientele structure effect can be achieved. Item-for-item charges do not have this impact. This article examines whether for both types of charge in general specific clientele structure effects can be proved, if explicit preferences of customers are taken into account – which has not be done hitherto. To this end, sales functions are derived from the preference intensities of “small customers” and “big customers”. It proves that the views on clientele structure effects of charges hitherto supported in the banking literature can be upheld only under not very realistic assumptions concerning the preference intensities of the two clientele segments. It is shown that under special conditions clientele structure-neutral pricing is optimal when the preference-weighted contribution margins of the clientele groups are in conformity with each other.