Citi - So Bold

I have been a customer of Citibank's for almost 20 years. In that time, Citi has gone through a few CEOs and most recently appointed Vikram Pandit to lead the company.

Last month I received the following email from Vik:



By this mindless waste of time, customer SPAM delivered under the name of the CEO, Citi is my latest Company Acting Badly:

1. Vik wants me to "be among the first to know" of the new things Citi is doing. Do I feel special? No. Any friend I have who banks online with Citi received the same email.

2. Vik wants me to know of "the bold steps ... at Citi". Were there any of these bold steps in his email? No. Have I received another email, letter or call from Citi in almost 50 days of these bold steps? No. Do these bold steps exist?

3. His commitment is "create an experience in which services are seemless". Since Vik sent this via email, how about he starts with Citibank online. Why do I have a different experience if I log into Citibank.com and Citicards.com?

How can a company as large as Citi set up customer expectations for some Bold new steps and not deliver? Did Mr. Pandit even read the email that went out under his name or did some lawyer water it down to be utterly meaningless?

Since Citi named Vikram Pandit as its CEO on December 10th, the stock has fallen some 51% from $34.77 to $16.76 as of June 30th. You can see the stock chart here.

Updated 11/14/08: here