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In an exclusive interview on the bank’s current position in the financial arena, both within and outside the country, P.A. Lionel, Senior Deputy General Manager (International, Treasury and Investment) of BOC, states that the bank has emerged to accurately safeguard its position amidst the stiff competition in the market.
“At present, Bank of Ceylon has the largest foreign currency deposits base in Sri Lanka. More than 34% of the foreign currency base in Sri Lanka is with us. Today, we possess the lion share in trade finance with a 58% market share, inward remittances with a 40% market share and treasury operations with over a 50% market share. The bank is very keen in improving its inward remittances and foreign currency deposits base,” he said.
BOC has over 1,000 customer touch points that cover 609 branches and 503 ATMs and over 860 foreign correspondents. “We have implemented the greatest deal of foreign representation in Middle Eastern countries, especially in Israel, Cyprus, South Korea, Italy, France, Japan, Canada and Australia. Under our globalisation program, in another three years we will strengthen our presence in the whole world,” he said.
Fringe benefits for NRFC customers
The bank’s NRFC facilitation is also of unique importance to customers. “We have introduced an attractive loan scheme for our NRFC customers. These include pre-departure loans for visa and additional expenses and loans to build houses. NRFC customers are covered by an insurance scheme of Rs. 1 million. The bank itself opens an NRFC account of US$ 5 on behalf of a customer who leaves the country for foreign employment.
They also become qualified for several raffle draws that include a monthly mega draw conducted by the bank at home and abroad. In addition, we also conduct pre-departure awareness campaigns for our customers where they are educated on the accurate means of use of their hard earned money and also make them aware of formal ways of remitting money earned abroad. We have observed that a large portion of inward remittances are channelled through unauthorised agents and our main objective here is to encourage and draw them back to the formal banking system,” he said.
Bank of Ceylon also works ahead to enhance and improve many projects implemented by the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment.
The bank extends sponsorships to Sri Lanka Embassies abroad to conduct socio-cultural and recreational events and programmes to boost the spirit of the Sri Lankan masses working abroad. “Recently we deployed five teams under the initiative of the Deputy General Managers from our Head Office to organise New Year Festivals and events for these employees. Besides, we also organise such events in collaboration with foreign embassies in several countries. We introduced a real time remittance system that will ease a lot of difficulties and inconveniencies faced by our customers working abroad. With the system in operation they can remit money and credit accounts within a few seconds,” he stated.
In a series of brand new raffle rewards for its NRFC customers, the bank will offer return air tickets for three grand winners. Upon the results of the draw three prospective customers employed in three countries will be selected for the prize. Accordingly, 15 return air tickets will be distributed among three winners from each country. To attract more customers to its efficient and worldwide network of international banking, and as a gratitude for their dedication to enrich the national economy through work abroad, BOC has also decided to apply and introduce competitive exchange rates and interest rates for foreign currency remittances and deposits in the near future.
“Very soon we will be working in collaboration with exchange and remittance houses abroad. Such facilities will be offered especially in countries such as Canada, Singapore, India and Italy. At present we operate overseas branches in the Maldivian Republic, India and the UK. Currently, our branch in London functions as a subsidiary of the bank and upon that license we hope to enter Europe to canvas more business,” he said.
Reaching the apex of global banking
Last year, BOC received the global recognition as one of the top 1,000 banks in the world. The survey was conducted by the world’s premier banking and finance magazine, ‘The Banker’. The bank also won a Bronze award for Overall category for its exceptional performance, a Silver award for Extra Large category and a Gold award for Banking and Financial Services category at the National Business Excellence Awards 2012. Fitch Rating Lanka Ltd. has upgraded the bank’s National Long-Term Rating to AA+ (lka) Stable Outlook, which is the highest rating awarded to a local commercial bank.
The bank recently introduced night banking facility at its Wellawatte Branch and 365-day banking facility at the Head Office Branch in Colombo. Weekend banking facilities are also available at several selected branches on Saturdays and Sundays. The bank has introduced a 24 hour call centre to enable customers and prospective customers to obtain any information on products and services of the bank.
“The bank reached a historical milestone in 2012 by achieving the highest profits among all institutions in Sri Lanka. It became the first bank in Sri Lanka to reach a remarkable milestone by achieving Rs. 1.0 trillion in assets in the year 2012. The bank also successfully completed a US$ 500 million bond issue for the second time in April this year with no road shows and within a period of one day which was 6 times oversubscribed. The bonds were purchased by investors in the UK and Asia.
“These developments are clear signs of the trust and credibility placed by foreign investors in the bank. To meet any challenging situation in the financial market, we have maintained the highest liquidity ratio in the bank.”
BOC’s capital adequacy ratio is comfortable and at 12.36% (group) as at December 2012, which is well above the CBSL norm of 10%. In addition bank has many plans to increase capital adequacy during next three years. BOC has been issuing Rupee debentures in order to strengthen tier II capital.
Higher productivity through professionalism and technological advances
“We have a highly capable and professional human resource of 9,000 employees islandwide as well as globally to enhance the bank’s performance for greater productivity. Our customer base at home and abroad is more than 10 million. In the near future we will go for mobile banking. Most of our branches are open around the clock whilst many other branches offer 365-day banking facilities. These details clearly signify the bank’s stability and capability to maintain a higher growth and security for the customer deposits with us,” Lionel.
During the last few years, the bank has invested nearly Rs. 655.3 million to upgrade the bank’s network infrastructure, core banking system and disaster recovery infrastructure to provide the bank with the required technological platform to expand its operations.
The financial stability of BOC, trust and 74 years of service in the market have made it the number one bank in terms of profits, scale and choice of the people in the country.
