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Ghana Commercial Bank Limited (GCB) recorded an increase of more than 500,000 customers for their GCB ReadyCash ATM cardholders as against 180,000 customers two years ago. The bank hopes to register most of its 1.5 million customers as ATM cardholders in future.

A statement issued  in Accra on Monday said the bank, in its efforts to improve customer services during latter part of 2011, introduced a bouquet of electronic-based products and services that had transformed customer service in the bank and reduced turn-around time to the barest minimum while offering various forms of self-service to customers.

It said the products and services included Free ATM services, GCB Debit cards; personal loans in 24 hours, SMS banking and Internet banking for both corporate and individual customers.

“All these products except the personal loans facilitate customer contact through self-service without them having to be physically present in the banking hall.”

The statement said with personal loans in 24hours, approvals for loans can be given the same day if the customer meets all requirements -- and within 10 seconds of in-putting the required customer information into the automated loan processing system, a customer will know whether they could get the facility or not.

“This explains why GCB has been able to satisfy the needs of some 14,000 customers who had requested facilities through the expedited loan process since the system went live four months ago.”

It noted that since loans granted had risks, the bank's risk management and legal services has been given the requisite impetus to monitor and recover loans.

According to the statement, the GCB SmartPay system made it more convenient for students to pay fees and also influenced the bank’s deposit mobilisation effort, resulting in an increase of deposits by GH¢788 million or 63 percent in two years.

It said GCB corporate customers were also reaping the benefits of a revamped corporate banking Internet platform with modules, which allowed bulk payments to be made by the companies straight through to the beneficiaries without having to come to the bank.

The statement stated that the bank will continue to work to reposition itself as a well-respected bank in the eyes of customers and all stakeholders by ensuring loan growth among small, medium and corporate enterprises, and continuing work on governance and risk-management issues.

It indicated that the bank will pay attention to the refurbishment of branches, which started last year and has resulted in 18 branches across the country undertaking major renovations, as well as cost-reduction and productivity enhancement.

B&FT