FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE OF PUBLIC SECTOR COMMERCIAL BANKS IN ANDHRA PRADESH STATE WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO CUSTOMER PERCEPTIONS

In order to organize and to ensure a strong, hard and securing banking sector, business performance of the banks have to be analyzed and evaluated. In this context this paper aimed to study the financial performance of public sector banks. For this purpose a stratified sample of 240 customers of SBI, PNB and UNB (80 from each banks) are considers and opinions of them were collected on Reliability, Assurance, Tangibility, Empathy and Responsibility of banks. The findings of this study indicate that customers perceive public sector banks as reliable in delivering core banking services. Although public sector banks provide confidence through customer-oriented services and loan facilities, greater attention should be given to improving financial products, customer benefits, and digital security measures. Moreover, customers are moderately satisfied with the physical infrastructure and banking environment, banks should improve branch accessibility, customer information materials, and technological infrastructure to provide better service quality. While banks have established strong customer relationships through supportive repayment policies and friendly services, simplifying loan sanction procedures and improving financial guidance can further strengthen customer satisfaction. Hence, PNB performs better in reliability and tangibility, SBI ranks highest in assurance, while UNB excels in empathy and responsibility. These findings suggest that each bank possesses distinct strengths in service quality, highlighting the need for targeted strategies to improve weaker dimensions and enhance overall customer satisfaction.