YEREVAN. – We have registered a sharp growth both in the number of accounts of corporate customers and the amount of transfers this year, IDBank Corporate Business Director Sergey Virabyan said in an interview with Armenian News-NEWS.am.
Mr. Virabyan, three months ago IDBank introduced a new proposal supposed for the corporate customers. What is your target? Is this decision justified?
Let me first remind of the proposal. RA resident legal entities and sole proprietors have an opportunity to open a bank account free of charge, to receive free of charge account service and make USD, EUR, RUB and GEL transfers via SWIFT free of charge through “Our” system. Thus, the Armenian entrepreneurs can get loans from the annual interest rate starting from USD 6.9 percent and in AMD, starting from 10 percent of annual interest rate.
When drawing up this proposal, we had an intention to provide Armenia-based entrepreneurs with a chance to do the main payments and calculations free of charge and to check the quality, speed and convenience of our services. If a customer is happy with our work, he can become a customer-partner of IDBank.
I want to note that the proposal will be in force for six months, that is, it expires on December 30. However, I want to reveal a secret, after analyzing the interest of our customers, we are discussing the opportunity to extend the deadline.
As we know, nowadays many banks and other organizations, when advertizing their products or services, offer services without charge or with zero percent, but we understand that these are marketing tricks.
How would you describe the free of charge services provided within your offer? Is it likely to be a marketing trick, and are there any hidden costs?
We did something clear. As I’ve already mentioned our principle is mutual benefit and establishment of partnership, so we preferred to cover the costs providing Armenian entrepreneurs with an opportunity to get acquainted with the Bank. A very simple and straightforward approach.
What was the response to this proposal from your customers? Do you notice intensification of activities in the target group? Are the indicators growing?
We have been conducting weekly monitoring since June, and I can state there is a sharp increase both in the number of accounts of corporate customers accounts and the amount of transfers. There is intensification in the area of loans, especially SME loans.
Does it mean that IDBank is targeted at supporting SMEs? Does it include business expansion support?
You know, I do not like the word ‘support’ in this context. The Bank, as well as the entrepreneurs, is a profit-making organization and we can say that we are working on the principle of mutually beneficial partnership. Our employees carry out daily market research and analysis and make adjustments to meet customer requirements in order to maximize the Bank's products and services. IDBank aims to provide customers with a wide range of banking services and to offer complex services. I want to underline that this is done to build Bank-customer relationship on the basis of partnership.
It is not a secret that under current conditions of the banking competition, banks try to stand out by their offers, which suggests using a personal approach to customers. To what extent is IDBank considering these trends when offering new products to the market?
Thank you for the question, as I do appreciate my personal work with clients. Based on many years of experience in the banking system, I can confidently say that the Armenian market, both banking and corporate, is so unique and competitive that every corporate client requires individual approach and attitude and, of course, IDBank suggests the institute of individual manager. Each customer, based on his/her business peculiarities, gets a personal approach and attitude, and this is a right approach.
After the stormy rebranding period, when the Bank is already recognizable, do you expect introducing more active programs? Do you have news for the Bank’s corporate customers?
The Bank already offers a wide range of banking products and services, which, as I have mentioned, are constantly being improved and adapted to market requirements. The Bank has recently signed a memorandum of cooperation with the Export Insurance Agency of Armenia. We have been cooperating with the German-Armenian Fund for 10 years as well as with other entities. As a result of cooperation, the Bank is capable to provide quite profitable products. Let me note that the work in this direction continues: we are seeking new partners to make our clients happy with new services and to help them do business smoothly.
