Use simplified due diligence for opening bank accounts- Finance Minister tells commercial banks

Last Updated on Tuesday, 26 November 2024, 23:09 by Denis Chabrol

(Left to right) Demerara Bank Limited’s (DBL) Chief Executive Officer, Dowlat Parbhu; Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh and Chairman of Demerara Distillers Limited, Komal Samaroo.

Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh on Tuesday appealed to commercial banks to comply with a Bank of Guyana directive to use the simplified due diligence requirements for opening bank accounts that would attract monthly deposits of GY$500,000 or less.

“It would appear to me that this simplified guideline is not well-known,”  he said. Dr Singh said Guyanese should not experience long wait times to open accounts in Guyana in contrast to other countries because they are all working with the same Anti-Money Laundering and Countering of Financing Terrorism (AMLCFT) regime. “I would like to ask Demerara Bank’s support and the banking sector’s support to join us to out out there more aggressively the simplified procedure for opening a bank account,” he said.

The Finance Minister asked DBL to help government to “more aggressively” publicise the very simple requirements that Guyanese need to open a bank account “and make sure that everybody knows this is all you need to have and present to open a bank account.” Dr Singh also remarked that sometimes those simplified guidelines do not always “trickle down” to the staff at the banks’ counters.

He issued the call after Demerara Bank Limited’s (DBL) Chief Executive Officer, Dowlat Parbhu boasted about his financial institution’s use of the simplified due diligence requirements and the 95 percent Online service for opening bank accounts via its new website www.demerarabank.com which incorporates  Sales Force,  the best Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platform.

Those Know Your Customer (KYC) requirements are identification, address, proof of income and Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN). He said of someone has  an identification and TIN only but no proof of address or proof of income, the bank could take a declaration from the person whose monthly deposit is under GY$500,000.

Speaking at a forum titled “Banking Made Easier” that was organised by World Trade Center Guyana and DBL, Mr Parbhu said his bank would be asking government to integrate its digital identification card system to allow for verification of bank customers in a matter of seconds through Artificial Intelligence (AI).

He highlighted that DBL was leading Guyana’s credit growth, with a 34 percent increase- GY$24 billion”- in lending over the last 12 months, “the highest in our history and the highest in the industry”. He said that accounted for 38 percent of total lending – GY$64 billion- done by all  six commercial banks over the same period. “Basically, DBL’s expansion of credit outpaced all the banks in Guyana including the largest bank by not only percentage but also by value,” he said.

The DBL boss also said his bank was the only one in Guyana and the Caribbean with zero non-performing loans, although it has increased lending by 138 percent over the last five years in contrast to 57.5 percent by the five other banks over the same period.