Last 11th September 2014, the Banking, Insurance and Pension Fund Supervisor, Superintendencia de Banca, Seguros y AFP´s, adopted Circular G-176-2014 on Customer Care Services, in order to have tools enabling greater control over the financial-customer care service, which was then amended on 31st December that same year. The main obligations that the Circular establishes for financial institutions include:

1. Implementation of manuals for queries, complaints and information requests;
2.  Quarterly reporting on complaint performance;
3.  Dissemination of statistical data on the website regarding complaints most frequently presented by users;
4. Filing of quarterly statistical data with the supervisor, SBS, regarding complaints, to presented within fifteen          days after the end of each natural quarter; and,
5.  Preparation of an annual training plan for the staff dealing with the public’s complaints and/or queries.

These obligations will impose higher costs on the financial institutions, while the benefit for the users is not especially clear, as the reporting required of the institutions is mainly intended for the regulator. The information is statistical in nature, leading some to question just how helpful it will really be to users, who are usually more concerned about the non-statistical aspects of their finance.