Responsible practices

Our approach and performance

Banking depends on trust. Our stakeholders, including governments, regulators, customers, communities and our employees, expect us to grow our business responsibly. This is particularly important as we move through uncertain times, and are faced with worsening economic conditions globally, and we enter and expand in countries where legal and regulatory frameworks are different to those in our traditional markets of Australia and New Zealand.

We have introduced clear governance structures; are improving management of social, environmental and reputation risks and opportunities; are supporting our customers facing hardship; and are contributing to the communities we serve.

Our long-term objective is to make responsible practices the foundation of our decision making. This will include training our people to more deeply understand social and environmental issues relevant to our clients so that together we can effectively manage the risks and maximise opportunities for market differentiation, while promoting a culture of respect for each other and our communities.

About some of our flagship initiatives

Supporting customers in hardship

Dedicated teams in Australia and New Zealand are helping customers manage and emerge from periods of financial difficulty. Our Customer Connect program has been established to make it as easy as possible for customers facing financial difficulty to get the help they need, when they need it.

Find out how ANZ is supporting customers in hardship.

Respecting people and communities

We have drawn together a set of standards called ‘Respecting people and communities: ANZ’s approach to human rights’. These standards help us to develop a culture of respect in the way we treat our employees, work with our clients and suppliers, and contribute to the communities where we operate.

Find out more about our approach to human rights.

Supporting our communities

ANZ has made a long term public commitment to invest in the communities in which we operate. In 2012 we contributed around $14.9 million in cash, time, and in-kind services, based upon the internationally recognised methodology for reporting corporate community involvement, the LBG. We also contribute to communities by ‘foregoing revenue’, for example, the cost of providing low or fee free accounts to government benefit recipients, and waiving fees in response to emergencies and hardship. When we include such contributions, our community investment is closer to $69m, of which around $54.1m is foregone revenue.

Find out more about our approach to the community.

More information

2013 targets

Improve customer satisfaction and achieve the No. 1 or 2 position amongst major banks in our core markets for our Retail, Commercial and Institutional businesses.
Resolve 90% of customer complaints within 5 business days.
Implement across Australia our hardship awareness tools, which will help customers in distress by enabling our staff to identify at risk customers, and offer them targeted advice and support.
Increase our lower-carbon gas and renewables power generation lending by 15-20% by 2020 (Project and Structured finance specific).
Improve our ability to manage social & environmental risks by specialised training for a further 1,000 lending staff; and train 200 senior staff in our Sustainability Leadership Program.

Our results

2012 highlights
2012 highlights Our ability to compete today and sustain growth in the future depends on employing highly skilled, motivated people, equipped to make responsible decisions. This year we continued to emphasize our Values and Behaviors as central to our business strategy as we build a business that delivers responsible growth and prosperity for our customers, shareholders, people and communities. Employee engagement remained steady at 70%. 37.8% women in management. Retained No. 1 position Relationship Strength Index position for Lead Relationships in the 2012 Peter Lee Associates Large Corporate and Institute Relationship Banking Research in Australia. Piloted a new Sustainability Leadership Program training course, aimed at staff in the International and Institutional Business (IIB). The half-day course is delivered in partnership with WWF-Australia and is designed to help staff make more informed decisions, considering the social and environmental contexts in which our clients operate. Updated our People and Communities statement to reflect the release of the United Nations Principles on Business and Human Rights. Following enquiries from external parties, including Socially Responsible Investor groups, we made it clear that by publicly supporting the UN Global Compact we acknowledge the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights and the three other Conventions underpinning the Compact. $69m contributed to communities ($14.9m in direct community investment and $54.1m through foregone revenue)^#. Assisted more than 32,000 people facing financial hardship in Australia and New Zealand. Nearly 87,000 hours volunteered by employees. Introduced a Hydropower policy, supplementing our existing Water and Energy policies. # The cost of providing low or fee free accounts to government benefit recipients, and waiving fees in response to emergencies and hardship.

2012 highlights

2012 highlights

Our ability to compete today and sustain growth in the future depends on employing highly skilled, motivated people, equipped to make responsible decisions. This year we continued to emphasize our Values and Behaviors as central to our business strategy as we build a business that delivers responsible growth and prosperity for our customers, shareholders, people and communities.

Employee engagement remained steady at 70%.
37.8% women in management.
Retained No. 1 position Relationship Strength Index position for Lead Relationships in the 2012 Peter Lee Associates Large Corporate and Institute Relationship Banking Research in Australia.
Piloted a new Sustainability Leadership Program training course, aimed at staff in the International and Institutional Business (IIB). The half-day course is delivered in partnership with WWF-Australia and is designed to help staff make more informed decisions, considering the social and environmental contexts in which our clients operate.
Updated our People and Communities statement to reflect the release of the United Nations Principles on Business and Human Rights. Following enquiries from external parties, including Socially Responsible Investor groups, we made it clear that by publicly supporting the UN Global Compact we acknowledge the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights and the three other Conventions underpinning the Compact.
$69m contributed to communities ($14.9m in direct community investment and $54.1m through foregone revenue)^#.
Assisted more than 32,000 people facing financial hardship in Australia and New Zealand.
Nearly 87,000 hours volunteered by employees.
Introduced a Hydropower policy, supplementing our existing Water and Energy policies.

# The cost of providing low or fee free accounts to government benefit recipients, and waiving fees in response to emergencies and hardship.

2011 highlights
2011 highlights Employee engagement increased from 64% to 70% this year. $3.7m was provided to assist communities affected by natural disasters across Australia, New Zealand and the Asia Pacific region. 91,410 hours were volunteered by our employees and skilled volunteering pilots are now underway in Australia, the Philippines and Papua New Guinea. We have assisted more than 14,000 people facing hardship in Australia and New Zealand. We developed a new Supplier Code of Practice which outlines the social, environmental and governance standards we expect suppliers to meet as a condition of doing business with us. We concluded our review of our four sensitive sector policies on Forestry, Energy, Water and Mining and Minerals. We implemented mandatory online training for Credit Approval Discretion staff to take greater account of social and environmental risks. To date, more than 84% of staff have completed this course. We continue to lead the major Australian banks on retail customer satisfaction. ANZ moved to outright first lead bank status in both Australia and New Zealand in the Peter Lee Relationship Survey this year.

2011 highlights

2011 highlights

Employee engagement increased from 64% to 70% this year.
$3.7m was provided to assist communities affected by natural disasters across Australia, New Zealand and the Asia Pacific region.
91,410 hours were volunteered by our employees and skilled volunteering pilots are now underway in Australia, the Philippines and Papua New Guinea.
We have assisted more than 14,000 people facing hardship in Australia and New Zealand.
We developed a new Supplier Code of Practice which outlines the social, environmental and governance standards we expect suppliers to meet as a condition of doing business with us.
We concluded our review of our four sensitive sector policies on Forestry, Energy, Water and Mining and Minerals.
We implemented mandatory online training for Credit Approval Discretion staff to take greater account of social and environmental risks. To date, more than 84% of staff have completed this course.
We continue to lead the major Australian banks on retail customer satisfaction.
ANZ moved to outright first lead bank status in both Australia and New Zealand in the Peter Lee Relationship Survey this year.

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Responsible practices

Corporate Responsibility