Commercial Bank in tie up with Ria Financial Services for remittances

Wednesday, 25 April 2012 00:02 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Strengthens money transfer services with world’s third largest player

Commercial Bank has tied up with Ria Financial Services, the third largest money transfer company in the world, substantially enhancing its offering in the sphere of remittances.

This paves the way for Sri Lankans to collect from Commercial Bank branches monies remitted from any of the 140,000 locations of Ria’s global network in 140 countries on six continents. Some of the locations covered by Ria’s network include key corridors such as USA, Canada, Italy, Cyprus, Australia France, UK, Germany, Switzerland, and the agreement will also open up new corridors for remittance offering, the bank said.

Commercial Bank commences this service with Ria deploying web service connectivity using the latest communication technology, becoming the first to do so in the entire South Asian region for Ria. This unique system will enable the bank to payout remittances routed from Ria’s large network of agents on a real time basis and will also enable the bank to process payments to accounts as well.

As a second step, the bank plans to upgrade its ATM’s for cardless payments for Ria remittance- beneficiaries who may not be customers of the bank. Presently, money can be credited to USD/GBP/EUR accounts of Commercial Bank. This facility would be extended to any bank account in Sri Lanka shortly, the bank said.

This latest agreement with a global player in the area of money transfers is a significant further expansion of the remittance services offered by the bank.

“Strategic ties with global players and a strong and steadily growing network of branches in Sri Lanka have made Commercial Bank’s offering in the area of remittances attractive for both remitters and their beneficiaries,” the Bank’s Deputy General Manager Operations Sanath Bandaranayake said, adding, “Commercial Bank remains committed to further strengthening its partner network, especially in areas with a large Sri Lankan expatriate population.”