Venkata Surya Prasad Indraganti, Senior AGM, Head of Transaction Banking, Wholesale Banking, Commercial Bank
Doha: The digital transformation drive by the Commercial Bank has become a huge success. More than 90 percent of Commercial Bank’s transactions are happening online, showing that the bank is playing a key role in the government’s vision of becoming a cashless society. According to a senior official of Commercial Bank, over 95 percent of retail transactions and over 90 percent of corporate transactions are being done online.
“I can proudly say that around 90 percent of our corporate and SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises) customers do their transactions online. In case of retail customers, more than 95 percent of transactions are being done online. It means that more than 90 percent of our retail customers do not come to bank counters,” Venkata Surya Prasad Indraganti, Senior AGM, Head of Transaction Banking, Wholesale Banking, Commercial Bank told The Peninsula.
Commercial Bank has seen a sharp rise in the adoption of digital banking solutions over the past few years. The switch towards digital banking was further accelerated by COVID-19 pandemic that led to imposition of several social-distancing measures for an extended period of time.
“Adoption of digital banking solution has grown substantially over the past few years particularly in Corporate Banking. Three years back the ratio of online transactions in the overall transactions was around 40 to 50 percent for Commercial Bank,” he explained.
Within the corporate banking division, main areas where online transactions are happening are trade-related issuances, remittances, domestic transfers to other banks or customers.
Outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic provided a major boost to the adoption of electronic banking channels. The precautionary measures imposed by the authorities to COVID-19 pandemic restricted the movement of customers which encouraged them to use electronic banking channels.
Bank’s success in the field of digital banking has been recognised by many other agencies. In recognition of its innovative digital services Commercial Bank recently received the ‘Best Digital Bank’ award in Qatar for 2021 by AsiaMoney Magazine for the second year in a row.
Commercial Bank has consistently worked with its customers and provided them with all kinds of support needed to use the digital banking channels.
“We have been consistently talking to our customers, provided them training and provided them convenience in terms of doing it. We have also upgraded our systems. Today we also provide our corporate customers mobile option for doing their transactions online for example getting approvals, checking balance, generating reports online. All these have facilitated customers to adopt the new online channels,” he explained.
He believes that the usage of digital banking solutions will remain high in the coming years as customers have experienced the benefits of digital banking.
“We have provided our customers multiple options to go online. We believe customers will continue to adopt online channels. We are now seeing a new trend where some customers are asking for purely digital banking experience,” he added.
The bank will continue to unveil new digital innovations that enhance the experience of its customers, he added. Commercial Bank has launched several digital banking solutions in the past which are safe, secure and reliable; and have helped customers to complete transactions through digital mediums, at a time and place of their convenience.
