NEWS WIRE: India: Centurion Bank of Punjab Looks to Bring Mobile Payments to Rural Customers

Source: Business Standard.

Original article available here.

CHENNAI, February 21 – Centurion Bank of Punjab (CBoP) is looking towards setting up mobile banking villages. The concept envisages conducting banking transactions in villages through short service messages (SMS) on mobile phones.

For instance, if a farmer wants to purchase fertiliser, he can just send an SMS to a fertiliser dealer about his requirement. The dealer, in turn, will deliver the required fertiliser to the farmer. The payment for the fertiliser would be deducted from the farmer’s account by CBoP and transferred to the account of the fertiliser dealer. For this, both the farmer and the fertiliser should have their accounts with CBoP.

“We feel that there is a possibility of introducing mobile banking villages in the next three months. Following this, a villager can send an SMS even for purchasing biscuits leading to cashless transactions,” CBoP business director (wealth management, distribution and loans), Harpreet Singh, told Business Standard.

Singh, who had a look at the operations of the Hyderabad-based SKS Microfinance on Wednesday, said CBoP was also planning to expand its microfinancing activities. The bank, which is currently funding three microfinance institutions, intends to fund more such institutions.

According to Singh, CBoP will be shortly introducing Centurion Executiveship, Trusteeship and Real Estate Management Advisory (CERMA) services in Bangalore and Hyderabad.

Under CERMA, the bank offers a gamut of services including providing estate planning to high networth individuals and creation, custody and execution of wills besides upkeeping properties. Introduced in Delhi and Mumbai four months ago, the bank has created over 100 wills so far under this.

CBoP is also focusing on expanding its trade finance and forex services. It is ready to give bank guarantee against property to an extent of 50-60 per cent of the market value. It will also be issuing letters of credit to importers and exporters on a large scale, Singh said.

In the next three months, CBoP would add 20 branches to its existing network of 392 branches across the country.

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