Financial institutions largely agree they need to revamp their branch infrastructures, but hardly any have a clear idea of what the end product should look like, according to a new study by Celent, a Boston-based research and advisory firm.

As a result, many financial institutions seem to have fallen into an abyss of inaction, doing little to mitigate some of their biggest problems – falling branch traffic, mounting costs to modernize their branches and outdated operations. Just 11% of the respondents in the study said they have a clear vision of how they'll transform their branches. Nearly half (44%) said they weren't even working on developing a vision.

The problem isn't that financial institutions think their branches are fine the way they are. Four out of five respondents in the study, which was based on research from Celent's Branch Transformation Research Panel and conducted in May and June 2015, said they know transforming their branches is imperative. Panelists gave their own branch channel infrastructures an overall grade of C+, and less than a third said any aspect of their branch networks were very good or excellent, Celent found.