Banking TNT

Transactions through mobile:

FINO-MITRA:

FINO-MITRA (Mobile Based Information and Transactions), a comprehensive set of end-to-end offerings for enabling microfinance initiatives leveraging mobile as a platform for better mobile banking services to customers.

Services:

* Covers the entire range of services starting from operational tasks such as enrollment to complex transactions such as mobile commerce.

* Caters to the needs of the agents/ middlemen as well as the end users.

* Agents are offered Mobile Based Enrolment as well as Mobile Based POT.

* End users are offered Mobile Banking, Mobile e-wallet, M-commerce thus completing the solution ecosystem for enabling financial inclusion using mobile as a platform.

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Mobile Banking Strategy and Approaches:

The mobile banking strategy has 2 approaches

* Mobile banking for agent.

* Mobile banking for customers.

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Sustainability of Mobile Banking among the pyramid customers:

Initiatives to be seen to create a sustainable model are:

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* Robust Partnership:

o Using mobile phone as a channel for financial inclusion is definitely the way ahead due to the vast reach of the telcos irrespective of varied geographical locations and diversities

o A Telco-Business Correspondent alliance will go a long way in developing banking and financial solutions for the unbanked customer

o The private sector and government too needs to come ahead and support the Business Correspondents in their initiatives

o Once the market is tapped and the model of financial inclusion becomes scalable, all the stakeholders would benefit in the form of new revenue channels

* Innovative models:

o Since conventional modes of communication like a text sms do not work for base of the pyramid customers, newer modes of communication like voice alerts and IVR need to be looked at

o Since the customer already knows how to receive a call, receiving a voice alert on his mobile phone will be easier for him

o Further sending a voice alert in a regional language will be a value addition and help in building the trust of the customer

o IVR, being a self help channel, the customer can inquire/transact using his mobile phone/landline/PCO at his convenience

o The customer can choose to communicate in his preferred language while using the IVR solution

* Simple and Cost Effective Solution:

o Developing solutions for the base of the pyramid customers is no rocket science.

o The above information can be leveraged in developing a simple user experience for the end customer using mobile phone as a channel. Partnerships with educational institutions/research organizations can further enable organizations to strengthen their understanding of base of the pyramid customers

o Further it is important to understand that base of the pyramid customers do not have the ability to pay for expensive solutions, given the fact that they lead a hand to mouth existence. However they have a good savings habit, even thought the savings amount may be a meagre Rs.5/- to Rs10/-

* Training and Financial Literacy:

o Once it is known what works for the bottom of the pyramid customers a business correspondent can use its existing agent network to train the customer on the use of mobile technologies

o Financial literacy in terms of giving information about banking products and saving and investing can be carried out using voice technology and IVR, in addition to agent as a medium

Also, note that there always exists a financial need for the financially excluded customer, however difficult to match a banking product to address that need. This brings out the fact that more and more products tailor-made for financially excluded customer need to be in place. (For eg: No Frills savings account).

America elected the western industrialized world’s first non-white leader in 2008 in part to address an unprecedented global economic crisis brought on by eight years of a conservative administration that promoted unilateralism and deregulation of financial institutions to maintain dominance in a globalizing world. In the wake of that policy, the new administration secured legislation to regulate predatory banking practices that had contributed to consumer participation in the collapse of the country’s economic system.

The new banking regulations were due to go into effect in 2010 but the American public appeared unappeased by the far-off protections. Consumer confidence continued to plummet as unemployment rose to near 10 per cent nationwide, as widely reported by sources aggregated on Google News, among others.

Half-way into the new administration’s first year, a new consumer protection agency was proposed and was met with opposition by the conservative friends of bankers. A Commission was set up to investigate the causes of the crisis and America’s role in its dynamics, with the Commission’s head vowing to let -no stone go unturned- in identifying the actors and conditions that had led to a situation unseen since the Great Depression of the previous century.

The Commission’s report was to be released by the end of December. With the new curbs on banking practices not in effect until 2010, banks had the rest of the administration’s first year in which to pull out all stops to capitalize on consumer vulnerability.

Among other banking developments in 2009, interest rates on credit cards were hiked by up to 28 percent if payment was a day late. Promotional interest rates expired with no recourse but to accept higher rates or cancel accounts to lose credit flexibility. Accounts were cancelled for either nonuse or overuse and cards were disabled without prior notice for such reasons as security checks on suspicious card activity.

The upshot was the need to carry two or three cards to shop with confidence. Uncertainty no doubt contributed to the all important -consumer confidence- factor that continued to lag in the government’s efforts to stimulate the economy. On the consumer side, silent protest took the form of refusal to buy, sending the message that consumers were aware that unfairness had reached the stage of absurdity judged by common sense comparison with daily life. Rules of fair play are a staple of sports and form the basis for human relations. Violations lead to penalties, ousters, and in the personal realm, to divorces. The breadth of scenarios resulting from capricious applications of terms to agreements would not only be innumerable. They would include situations such as the following.

*Two people made a date for lunch. One decided not to show and decided it was not important to let the other know.

*Two people met for lunch at the invitation of one who stated his intention to pay. The purported host left once dessert was ordered.

*Three people agreed to meet for lunch. One was a minute late and was told the penalty was to pick up the entire tab.

*A club was established with a set amount for dues. The dues were raised without membership vote. Protestors were told to comply or abandon projects being carried out on the club’s behalf.

Further snapshots of life without a fair application of agreed-upon rules would demonstrate chaos, all the way back beyond humanity’s cave days and into the dark void before God made order in the universe. They would be a summary of the banking policies that had led the country into the need for an Obama.

Helen Fogarassy is a Hungarian-born American internationalist writer with a 20-year association to the United Nations. Her suspense novel, The Midas Maze, involves murderous hijinks in UN/US relations. Other books include The Light of a Destiny Dark, a novel about the Euro-American cultural gap and Mission Improbable: The World Community on a UN Compound in Somalia. All are available on web book sites. Visit her at www.helenfogarassy.com to get more.

The importance of compliance with legal, regulatory, social, ethical and other standards faced by businesses is highlighted by the high-profile UK legal case Chagger v Abbey National plc & Hopkins (2006), where an Employment Tribunal made a ruling of racial discrimination and, following Emilio Botin Abbey Santander banking group’s refusal to comply with the Tribunal’s order to reinstate Mr Chagger, ordered Abbey Santander shares to pay the record-breaking 2.8 million compensation award. Abbey Santander Group (the UK bank soon to be re-branded as Santander shares price, and being a part of the behemoth Emilio Botin Banco Santander Central Hispano Group – BSCH) dismissed Balbinder Chagger from employment in 2006, asserting compulsory redundancy as the reason. Mr Chagger, on the other hand, believed that the actual reason behind the termination of his employment was race discrimination. Mr Chagger was of Indian origin. He worked for Emilio Botin Abbey Santander price in the role of Trading Risk Controller. He earned approximately 100,000 per annum. He reported into Nigel Hopkins.

In the UK, the Financial Services sector is highly regulated. Financial institutions face an abundance of standards to comply with concerning their numerous stakeholders (regulators, authorities, the public, employees, customers, suppliers, competitors, shareholders, investors, and others). Compliance with all of the standards is part and parcel of conducting business in the UK Financial Services sector; financial institutions need to devote sufficient resources and energies to compliance and to compliance risk management. Compliance failures, that are either detected by regulators during inspections or reported by aggrieved parties to the appropriate jurisdictions, can result in extremely high-profile consequences, as shown by Chagger v Abbey National & Hopkins (2006); the Employment Tribunal recorded an abundance of compliance issues and failures committed by Emilio Botin Santander Abbey and Mr Hopkins, some of which are outlined below.

Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had failed to comply with the UK statutory redundancy dismissal procedure; it had failed to notify Mr Chagger in writing of the circumstances leading it to contemplate dismissing him and asking him to a meeting.

Emilio Botin Abbey Grupo Santander had failed to comply with the guidance on good practices regarding Equal Opportunity training recommended by the UK statutory Code of Practice on Racial Policy in Employment. Mr Chagger had made efforts to address the issues surrounding his dismissal directly with Santander Abbey and Mr Hopkins, through the company’s grievance and appeals procedures. However, Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had not provided any Equal Opportunity training to the managers it had allocated to consider Mr Chagger’s issues; Mr Chagger’s issues were simply dismissed out of hand by each and every manager. Emilio Botin Abbey Santander banking group had also failed to comply with the guidance on good practices concerning monitoring recommended by the UK statutory Code of Practice on Racial Policy in Employment. The Tribunal found an abundance of monitoring failures, in addition to the failures to give serious consideration to allegations of race discrimination and to investigate them promptly.

Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had failed to comply with the Tribunal’s order to reinstate Mr Chagger (ordered to remedy the unlawful wrongful act of racial discrimination committed by Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins). In the UK, reinstatement is regarded as the primary and preferred remedy for an unfair dismissal, because it enables the aggrieved employee to continue to enjoy both the mental satisfaction and the economic benefits of his role in the future. Emilio Botin Abbey Santander refused to reinstate Mr Chagger and the Employment Tribunal was dissatisfied with the reasons it gave for refusing to comply.

Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had failed to comply with the Race Relations Act (Questions and Replies) Order 1977. The Tribunal found that Emilio Botin Abbey Santander’s reply to Mr Chagger’s race discrimination questionnaire was evasive, and that Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had failed in answering Mr Chagger’s questions.

Both Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins had failed to comply with UK law on employment. The Employment Rights Act 1996 requires the selection of an employee for dismissal in a compulsory redundancy situation to be fair. Compulsory redundancy selection criteria must be applied fairly; they must be both objective and measurable. The Employment Tribunal found, however, that the compulsory redundancy selection criteria Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had applied were both highly subjective and un-measurable.

Mr Hopkins had failed to comply with the expected behaviours of a reasonable manager. He was highly criticised by the Employment Tribunal for the manner in which he had applied the compulsory redundancy selection criteria to Mr Chagger. As an example, the Employment Tribunal found that he had scored Mr Chagger down for getting on with work and being self-reliant, a characteristic that the Tribunal thought that reasonable managers might well consider to be an asset for an employee in Mr Chagger’s highly paid and highly responsible position, and score him more highly for.

Emilio Botin Abbey Santander had failed to comply with reasonable good practices and safeguard controls expected in compulsory redundancy situations; that of ensuring more than one manager is involved in the assessing and scoring of each of the employees in the redundancy pool (a control to safeguard the fairness of the scoring and to reduce the risks of bias). The Tribunal found, however, that Emilio Botin Abbey Santander did not implement this simple control mechanism. Alongside other significant factors, Mr Hopkins was single-handedly able to recommend to Abbey Santander’s management to dismiss one of the two Trading Risk Controllers that he managed (Mr Chagger being one), was single-handedly able to put to Mr Chagger an offer to take up voluntary redundancy (Mr Chagger refused Mr Hopkins offer, and no such offer was ever put to the other Trading Risk Controller), was single-handedly able to conduct the compulsory redundancy scoring and assessment of the two employees in the redundancy pool, and was single-handedly able to reduce Mr Chagger’s scores to ensure that he would be the employee who would be selected for dismissal.

Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins both had failed to comply with the UK discrimination law; the Tribunal ruled that they had both racially discriminated against Mr Chagger.

Emilio Botin Abbey Santander highlights the significance of compliance risk and its potentially very high-profile consequences on an institution’s reputation. The profile continued beyond the Employment Tribunal stage for Abbey Santander. Mr Hopkins and Emilio Botin Abbey Santander s appealed to the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) against the original Employment Tribunal’s ruling of racial discrimination and against the record-breaking 2.8 million compensation award. In 2008, the EAT upheld the original Tribunal’s ruling that both Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins had racially discriminated against Mr Chagger. However, the EAT accepted Abbey Santander’s appeal on the compensation award and remitted it to the original Tribunal for reconsideration. The case was appealed and escalated to the Court of Appeal (UK’s second highest court). The Court of Appeal’s List of Hearings showed the appeal was heard on 7/8 July 2009. The Court’s transcript of the hearing and judgement were not available when writing this article. The 11KBW set of barristers’ chambers, who represented Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins, had reported that the Court of Appeal hearing was to be about compensation only (i.e., not about racial discrimination also). That would appear to imply that the wrongful act of race discrimination committed by Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Nigel Hopkins was finalised by the EAT when it upheld the original Tribunal’s decision that Emilio Botin Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins had racially discriminated against Mr Chagger, and that Mr Chagger had appealed against the EAT’s decision to remit the compensation award to the Employment Tribunal stage for reconsideration.

The PNC Bank Online Banking service is offered by PNC Bank to its customers and account holders. This service enables the banks clients:

To access their accounts from any where in the world.
Perform various functions over the net itself, saving on time.

Features of PNC Bank Online Banking
PNC Bank Online Banking service is available for the banks customers free of cost. Following are the distinctive features of this service:

Account Summary: You can remain in touch with your finances by obtaining a summary of your PNC personal, business and investment accounts through this service.
Account Activity: You can access your accounts round the clock. You can check balances, review recent transactions and view images of the checks you have submitted.
Online Bill Pay: You can save time and money by paying your bills through this service. Online bill payment requires just a few minutes of your time, with you using just one simple screen to place your instructions. This service gives you the flexibility to decide how much you want to pay for each bill.
Online Statements: You can contribute on saving paper. You can use the PNC Bank Online Banking service to receive and view your statements online. You can also print or download statements for up to last 36 months.
Transfer Funds: Through this service, you can move your money to where you need it. You can either transfer funds between your PNC Bank accounts or between your PNC account and your accounts at other financial institutions.
AutoAlerts: You can use this facility to remain informed about every critical event related to your accounts and bills. This service can send you e-mail notifications to alert you about key account activity such as low balances, the arrival of direct deposits or overdrafts on your account.
Data Export: This facility in the PNC Bank Online Banking service enables you to download account activity in Excel, Microsoft Money or Quicken file formats in just a few clicks.

With millions of residents in Delhi and nearby regions, the need to have a smooth provision of electricity supply was paramount. Since long, people had been suffering due to erratic current cutbacks and lack of streamlined approach in supply. Further devastating was the lack of any rightful method of collection of bills from the residents. A few years ago, the scenario was reflected in long queues in the offices of Delhi Vidyut Board till July 2002. But then, power sector of Delhi was privatized and was taken over by BSES. This takeover also led to the transfer of various liabilities, assets, personnel and proceedings of the Delhi Vidyut Board in compliance with the transfer agreements. Now, majority of Delhi’s power distribution system remains under BSES Yamuna Power Limited or BYPL and BSES Rajdhani Power Limited and a third party North Delhi Power Limited, which is a venture between Tata Power and Govt of Delhi. With 3 separate jurisdictions for each of these units, Delhi’s power woes have almost ended. BSES New Delhi Apart from the facilities of efficient power supply by the BSES and NDPL, the losses have come down significantly and infrastructure improvement has been remarkable. But, one of the hallmarks of these changes through privatisation has been the convenience in the BSES bill payment by the residents. Earlier, people were required to pay through cash or demand drafts or cheques, which obviously is a cumbersome process for people in Delhi. They could deposit the bills in the customer care centres and kiosks. Currently, after the revision of the bill payment process and privatisation, a number of methodologies have been put forth by these organisations for the payment of dues. Bill payment kiosks are opened in various centres under the BYPL and BRPL. Residents can go to these places and pay by cheque or cash between 8 am and 8 pm, excepting the public holidays. There are also other options such as payment through counters, cheque in mail and drop boxes. But the one modality which has stolen the show is that of payment through net banking or BSES bill payment online. Online mode of payment is advantageous for few reasons: BSES Online Bill Payment By Net Banking Most people have online internet banking facilities, which are provided by their banks. Almost all the banks have nowadays facility to operate accounts online. Hence, payment of electricity bills monthly, doesn’t pose an issue for people. Rather, they would prefer doing so, as it allows them to make their payments from the comforts of their laptops and computers at homes and offices. It is but natural that electricity consumers in Delhi are opting for the internet banking facilities for BSES bill payment. The process of doing so is also quite easy. Consumers can select mastercard, visa card and other cards for banks like IDBI, SBI, PNB, Axis, and others. They can start by visiting the BSES Delhi official site and click on payment options. There will be an online confirmation and a transaction reference number. Then, the BSES account number would be asked, which consumers can fill in. A page then opens up, where consumers can see their particular bills for the said months, which is due. Payment process proceeds when they click on pay now option. On selecting the net banking option, customers would be redirected to their respective banks, where the user id and password has to be provided. Through a secured gateway, the amount would be instantly debited and it would reach the customer’s BSES account within 5 working days. BSES bill payment online has been a boon to the millions of power users in Delhi. With high end system of fee collections, lots of people have been benefited and quickly adopted this system of paying their bills without fail.