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Commonwealth Bank Sustainability Report 2010 For personal use only Contents About this report 3 A message from our CEO 4 Our sustainability scorecard 8 Who we are 9 Customers 12 People 20 Governance 27 Community 31 Environment 37 Bankwest 42 Metrics and Definitions 46 Independent Review Report 50 For personal use only About this report About this report For nearly 100 years, at the Commonwealth Bank we have been proudly working to help build a sustainable Australia. Today, we’re more determined than Scope United Nations Global Compact ever to support our customers, our The Sustainability Report 2010 covers We are a signatory to the Global employees, our shareholders and the the activities of companies owned Compact and committed to wider community, now and in the future. and operated by the Commonwealth communicating progress on integrating This report describes our key Bank Group within Australia, including the Global Compact principles in the sustainability initiatives over the last our subsidiaries, for the period 1 July areas of human rights, labour, the 12 months, and sets out focus areas 2009 to 30 June 2010. For the first environment and anti-corruption. This for the future. It is centred around our time the report includes the Bank of report fulfils our commitment to reporting five foundations of sustainability: Western Australia (Bankwest) which as part of this important initiative. Customers, People, Community, was acquired in December 2008. The Environment and Governance. Bankwest section begins on page 42. Independent assurance Key metrics in this report have been We publish an annual sustainability ASB Bank (ASB) is our wholly owned independently reviewed by KPMG. report because it’s important for us New Zealand bank. Read ASB’s See the ‘Independent Review to communicate our sustainability 2008–09 corporate responsibility report Report’ on page 50 for more details. initiatives to our customers and the ‘ASB in your community’ at asb.co.nz/ broaderFor personal use only community, and ensure we community-and-sponsorship/corporate- We are committed to provide transparency around how responsibility. improving all aspects we are continuing on our journey For more detailed information on our to be a sustainable business. financial performance, refer to our 2010 of sustainability across Annual Report found at commbank. the Group. com.au/about-us/shareholders/ financial-information/annual-reports/. Commonwealth Bank | Sustainability Report 2010 3 CEO message A message from our CEO Welcome to the annual Commonwealth Bank Group Sustainability Report. Over the 2009 –10 financial year we have continued to build sustainable practices into every aspect of our business through our focus on our five sustainability foundations – Customers, Ralph Norris CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER People, Community, Environment and Governance. By taking a sustainable approach now, we can create long-term value for our customers, our employees, our shareholders and the community. One way we can continue to enhance sustainability at the Commonwealth Bank is by developing our business strategy and our strategic priorities. Our strategy incorporates five areas of opportunity: customer service; business banking; technology and operational excellence; trust and team spirit; and profitable growth. In each of these areas, we have been working on initiatives and continuing to build a more sustainable business that contributes to an even more prosperous and successful Australia. Customer service Customer service is our highest priority. That’s why we have made it our goal to become number one in customer satisfaction. Our ‘determined to be different’ service promise means we place our customers at the centre of everything we do, and feedback from our customers shows that our efforts in this area have not gone For personal use only unnoticed. Over the year we have improved our customer satisfaction among our retail customers by 2.6 per cent, as measured by the Roy Morgan Research Main Financial Institution Retail Customer Satisfaction survey. Our people have also been working hard to provide our business customers with excellent customer service, 4 Commonwealth Bank | Sustainability Report 2010 CEO message “ By taking a sustainable approach now, we can create long-term value for our customers, our employees, our shareholders and the community.” while our wealth management customers have rated us number Trust and team spirit one in customer satisfaction in the Wealth Insights Platform For us, trust and team spirit are about creating a culture Service Level survey for the third year running. where our people feel engaged, passionate and valued. They are also central to the sustainability of our business, Business banking since engaged people create satisfied customers, leading This year we launched several initiatives to improve our service to better returns for our shareholders. to business customers. They included new developments in There is no doubt that our improvement in customer CommBiz, our real-time, online banking service for business, satisfaction has been possible because our people are more corporate and institutional customers; enhanced features in engaged and more satisfied with the Group as a place to work. NetBank, providing a more personalised service; and updates The results of our annual People and Culture Survey, set out to internal systems, allowing us to deliver when our customers on page 20 of this report, reflect this. need us most. We believe it is essential to support and enrich the Indigenous In a sometimes difficult economic environment, our communities in which we operate. Through our Reconciliation front-line business specialists continued to support our Action Plan we are implementing initiatives to create employment business customers – including 100,000 small-to-medium opportunities for Indigenous Australians, enhancing customer business customers – with the financial challenges they service for our Indigenous customers, and strengthening our faced during the year. people’s appreciation of Indigenous culture. You can read about our Indigenous initiatives throughout this report. Technology and operational excellence During 2009–10 we made substantial progress on our Core Profitable growth Banking Modernisation (CBM) project, designed to improve Profitable growth is not only a strategic priority but a good and modernise our systems and provide an exceptional measure of the sustainability of our business. And it isn’t only service experience for all of our customers. This significant, important for the Group; it also helps to support Australian long-term commitment involves an investment of around society generally. That’s because our growth creates $730 million over four years. employment opportunities, generates better returns to The CBM project will create a world-class customer service shareholders and government, and contributes to a stable platform. It’s an integral part of our vision to be Australia’s and secure banking system. finest financial services organisation through excelling in I am pleased to say that we have a strong history of profitable customer service. It also supports our focus on sustainability growth, which has continued during the 2009–10 financial by helping us to use resources more efficiently and leverage year. For our full year results ended 30 June 2010 we innovative technology to position our business for the future. announced Net Profit After Tax (NPAT) on a cash basis of For personal use only Most importantly, it allows us to significantly improve customer $6,101 million, which represents an increase of 42 per cent on service by: the prior year and a statutory NPAT of $5,664 million, which • Putting the customer at the centre of our processes. represents a 20 per cent increase on the prior reported year. • Simplifying and automating our processes to make banking Over the years we have also achieved significant total returns faster and easier for our customers and our people. for our shareholders, for example 36 per cent over two years and 70 per cent over five years. • Processing account transactions in real-time. Commonwealth Bank | Sustainability Report 2010 5 CEO message A message from our CEO Our ability to deliver sustainable growth is underpinned by good The importance we place on our people and the long-term view governance practices, prudent risk management and reliable we take of our business was reflected in decisions designed funding. And we continue to develop our capabilities in areas to retain talented employees while managing our cost base. which offer good opportunities to generate a higher return on We implemented a number of efficiency measures, including our shareholders’ investment. For example, our improvement freezing pay increases and cutting executive pay. We retained in customer satisfaction has allowed us to increase the talented staff so that, as business conditions improve, the right average number of products held per customer from 2.17 in people are there to take our business forward. June 2006 to 2.56 in June 2010 (according to Roy Morgan At the same time, we were determined to continue investing Research, based on Australians aged 14+, Banking and in the future of the business. As a result, we decided not to Finance customers). decrease capital expenditure and to maintain spending on We have also continued our focus on offshore growth, technology and operational excellence through projects such particularly in Asia where we launched a number of new as Core Banking