(AFP Photo)
The slowdown rate in Piraeus Bank-Egypt’s credit portfolio has declined, according to Retail Director Iman El-Essawy.
She added that a plan, strategy, and new programme for credit have been prepared, which were approved by the mother company in Greece, and new loans were also offered to citizens.
El-Essawy said that the growth of the retail banking sector reached roughly 47% in 2014, which marks an increase from EGP 851m by the end of 2013 to EGP 1.10bn by the end of 2014 and EGP 1.2bn by the end of March 2015.
She further pointed to the most important products offered via personal loans for employees, entrepreneurs, doctors, and university professors, as well as loans for buying cars and loans for pensioners in June 2014, which amounted to EGP 44m by the end of March 2015. El-Essawy announced the bank’s plan to increase retail banking by EGP 900m in 2015.
El-Essawy further pointed to a contract signed between the bank and MetLife Alico to market the insurance products through the bank’s 39 branches.
Piraeus Bank-Egypt places great importance on modern technological tools, prompting it to put forth a plan for offering Internet banking services as per the new regulations of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE), especially that the bank’s services in this sector are limited to giving the client an account summary and the banking transactions, according to El-Essawy.
The bank was authorised to offer Internet banking services in 2009, and started to apply them in 2010. The service was offered to individual clients in March 2012 and to company clients in 2013.
El-Essawy said that the bank thoroughly studied CBE’s regulations, which vary depending on each bank, affirming that Piraeus Bank-Egypt conducted careful studies to apply the Internet banking services accordingly. The bank’s plan for the service was recently presented to the control and supervision committee at the CBE to be studied, as a first step for the complete e-banking service to be introduced in 2016.
As for the debts, El-Essawy stated that EGP 140m were settled for retail banking since 2010 until March 2015, adding that for more than 90 days the slowdown rate was at less than 1%. This was due to the commitment of Egyptians and their desire to take out more loans.
