Source : Perth Now news
National Australia Bank short-changed 66,000 staff over more than a decade, Commonwealth Bank allegedly charged 42,000 customers secret fees for years.
The day after the scandals came to light, their bosses will appear before the federal parliament.
Commonwealth Bank boss Matt Comyn and NAB’s Andrew Irvine will be questioned at routine hearings into the big four on Friday.
Westpac and ANZ were quizzed on Thursday but while those hearings unfolded, the financial regulator launched civil penalty proceedings against the Commonwealth Bank over the alleged hidden fees.
The bank had tacked $8.5 million in undisclosed levies to its CommBiz accounts and mishandled complaints about the issue for more than a decade, according to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.
On the same day, NAB agreed to pay $169 million to staff it had underpaid over 15 years after self reporting to the Fair Work Ombudsman.
The bank was already likely to face heat during Friday’s hearings for planning to sack 2500 workers, including outsourcing about 180 roles to Vietnam and India.
That had met a furious response from Labor MP Ed Husic who last week called the move “frankly disturbing” in a social media post.
Mr Husic, who is chairing the two-day hearing block, alluded to the issue again during proceedings on Thursday.
“Thousands of positions cut in Australia, only to be offshored. Those decisions warrant scrutiny,” he said.
“Particularly where they involve technology, compliance and risk functions at a time when banks themselves tell us the risk environment is becoming more complicated.”
On Thursday, ANZ said its 3500-worker lay-off, announced in 2025 and already completed, was not AI-related but could not guarantee the technology would leave its workforce untouched forever.
Westpac, which announced it was cutting more than 100 positions in October, said replacing humans with AI was “not our posture”, describing its approach as more wait-and-see.
Late on Thursday, its chief executive Anthony Miller also revealed the bank had a 28 per cent gender pay gap which had only improved 1.6 per cent in the previous year.
“I don’t mean to be churlish, but that’s a rounding error isn’t it?” Mr Husic asked the Westpac boss, who responded it was a difficult metric to shift.
“Technology is a difficult space to get the gender equation right … so cry me a river on us getting this done faster,” Mr Miller said.
“I could do what others have suggested – outsource a stack of roles?”
“We’ve seen enough outsourcing in banks,” Mr Husic replied.
