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Vol. 4 :: No. 2 February,
2002 (Magh
- Falgun)
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Corporate |
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Kumari Bank The Pioneer Bank Goes Hi-tech By Business Age Correspondent Kumari Bank Limited (KML), since its very inception, has been getting acclaim in the financial market as a professional technology driven bank. The modern technology is doing wonders in banking transactions making the operation ‘easy, quick and efficient’ proving very beneficial in the changed globalized market.
In the Internet banking front, the balance enquiry page provides a summary of all accounts to which the customer has on-line access; the statement enquiry screen shows all the account transactions since the last statement was product; The on-line search facility allows the customers to specify the criteria used to locate and filter transaction date within a selected account. Similarly, under the new arrangement through internet banking, there is a facility that allows the customer to locate of filter transaction date within a selected account besides providing account transfer facility, transaction search, on-line standing orders, future dated payments, among others. Following the liberalization of economic policies by the government some 11 years back, the banking industry has blossomed with the opening of a number of commercial banks, financial institutions, cooperatives and development banks. More importantly, in today’s world, Kumari Bank has emerged as an attractive banking institution among ‘banks and customers’ in a very short span of time. Kumari Bank Limited, came into existence as part of Nepal Rastra Bank’s liberalization of the Nepalese banking industry, by starting it’s banking operations from April 3, 2001. Chairman of the Bank Mr Noor Pratap Rana talking to Business Age said, "currently, the bank is operating from its office located at Putali Sadak, Kathmandu and is in the process of expanding itself to other parts of the country in the near future. The bank has been established with the objective of providing a complete one-stop banking solution backed by state-of-the-art infrastructure and creating value to its valued customers, according to Rana. According to the CEO of the Bank Mr Surendra Bhandari, the bank has a mission to provide world class service to all customers at a higher satisfaction, practice total quality management, embrace good governance and optimize assets to achieve sound business growth. It has clear vision for customer satisfaction and embracing service excellence and professional culture as the employees have direct inputs and control over work processes and making transparent in all dealings and conduct. In the competitive environment , Kumari Bank aims to position itself as a different bank, providing a state-of-art technology and management setup. The bank has an aim to provide banking services to all segments of the economy, especially, middle class sector and to contribute towards economic development of the rural sector and the country as a whole.
Mr Bhandari is very optimistic that the bank will be a world class Nepalese Bank, with this in mind, it has already started concentrating its banking activities with modern technologies and innovative banking services such as boundary-less transactions by providing complete solutions of internet banking. "Besides new facilities in the corporate sector, the bank intends to provide a range of facilities in the retail sector including telebanking and ATM." Under the corporate banking, the bank has services like checking account which is a strong tool to give the much-needed flexibility in business. The features include low minimum balance, no withdrawal restrictions, no deposit restriction, nominal service charges, among others. The bank has a facility of business account which is considered a revolutionary concept for the first time in Nepal. It has diversified its products by introducing time deposit which has features like reliable income with high rates of return, attractive interest rates, tenures from 14 days to more than 2 years and so on. One of the facilities the bank has introduced is ‘call deposit,’ where its customers can earn interest and that earned interest can be withdrawn on a short notice. Regarding the lending category, the bank has working capital financing against stocks and account receivables to meet short-term cash requirement in the form of cash credits (overdraft) and demand loans. Similarly, there is a facility of ‘term loan’ for capital expenditures of small/medium/large scale companies for periods in excess of one year. There is also a facility for short term loan for small/medium/large scale companies for periods less than one year.
Other services of the bank include on hire purchase, bills discounting purchase, export credit that is for pre-shipment credit, import credit, loan syndication, etc. On the foreign trade front, the bank has facilities like letters of credit, full-fledged trade finance set-up catering to all trade-related requirements and extent import financing and export financing through L/C accepted globally. Another special feature of the bank is retail banking where customers can open their account with as low as Rs. 1000, the facility for monthly average minium balance of Rs. 1000, attractive interest rates, withdrawal limit of Rs. 500,000 per month and interest rate for saving deposit 6 per cent. Similarly, in fixed deposit, flexible tenures starting from 14 days to more than 2 years giving highest interest rates, half yearly interest payment getting facility, auto renewal and pre-liquidation facility available and so on.
The bank’s liquid time deposit can provide a facility to withdraw upto 80 per cent of the value of time deposit at a minimal cost. The bank also provides vehicle loans at reasonable interest rates under installment basis, depending on receiver’s income. Similarly, the bank has the facilities for home loan, consumer producing financing, educational loans, travel loans etc. The Board of Directors of the Bank are Noor Pratap Rana, Mr Santosh Lama, Mr Naresh Dugar, Mr Dibya Mani Rajbhandari and Mr Ameer Rana. The management team includes Mr Suman Joshi, AGM, Mr Geha Dhungana, Manager -Operations, Mr Tika Chapagain, Manager-Control and Mr Bhaskar Rimal, Manager-Credit, and lastly the CEO Mr Surendra Bhandari. According to Mr Noor Pratap Rana, in a very short nine months span of time, the bank has leaped ahead, because of its strong and efficient management, expert personnel and high-tech operations. |
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