Press Release
United Bank achieves 100% CBS Status
Kolkata, September 14, 2009
Shri T M Bhasin, ED, United Bank of India,
announcing 100% CBS achievement on 14.09.2009
With the migration of final lot of 32 branches to CBS last weekend, United Bank of India has today become the First Nationalised Eastern India based Bank to have achieved the milestone of 100% CBS. Announcing this to the media, the Bank’s Executive Director, Shri T.M. Bhasin informed that in a short span of 2 years all 1453 branches have been migrated to Centralised Data Centre at Kolkata with Disaster Recovery Set up (DRS) in a different seismic zone at Mumbai. With this, 1.5 crore customers of the United Bank shall be able to use complete bouquet of services like ‘United Anywhere Cash/Transfer/Remittance’, ‘United Speed Clearing’, ‘United Fast OCC’ (for collection of upcountry instruments), etc.
Biometric ATMs :-
Shri Bhasin informed that United Bank of India is the First Bank in Eastern Region to have introduced Biometric ATMs, latest one having been inaugurated by the Hon’ble Finance Minister Sri Pranab Mukherjee at Jangipur, Dist. Murshidabad.
[[Incidentally, during the incumbency of Shri Bhasin as General Manager (IT), Oriental Bank of Commerce became the First North Based nationalized Bank, to have achieved 100% CBS Status in November 2007 after which he moved as Executive Director in United Bank of India, which had a very low level of technology implementation at that time. Shri Bhasin has pursued research on “Implementation of E-Commerce in Indian Banking” under C.H. Bhabha Research Scholarship of Indian Bank’s Association in 1999-2000 and his thesis was later published as a Reference Book on the subject. Shri Bhasin has thus used this technology skills for achieving 100% CBS in two major nationalized Banks in different geographies.]]
Challenges :-
When asked about the challenges in implementation of CBS, Shri Bhasin shared that last-mile connectivity issues in the 252 remote branches in Eastern & North Eastern sector; training and grooming of Counter Staff/Officers of relatively higher age profile; finer jobs of data sanitization/cleansing before migrating 30 to 35 branches every weekend, were some of the issues engaging constant attention.
On line United Banking :-
United Bank has also simultaneously interfaced CBS platform with online payment facilities like ECS, RTGS & NEFT. All the United Bank Branches will offer Telebanking, Internet Banking facility for e-payment of service tax, Excise Duty and other Direct Taxes, Cash Management Service for corporate clients etc. United Bank also has set up a full-fledged Call Centre to address the customers’ requirements.
IT enabled Government Business Software applications like Anti Money Laundering (AML), Asset Liability Management (ALM), NPA Management, Govt. Business Module (GBM) etc., have also been integrated with CBS system. United Bank is also participating in the Cheque Truncation System (CTS) launched by Reserve Bank of India in NCR, Delhi. Other RBI initiatives like CFMS, PDO-NDS, CBLO & OLTAS have also been integrated with the CBS system. United Bank also happens to be the First nationalized Bank in introducing the ECS at a Non-MICR Clearing center at Haldia.
Use of Latest Connectivity modes :-
Shri Bhasin, Executive Director, United Bank of India informed the media that all these network based applications ride on Bank’s own Virtual Private Network (VPN) which has Lease Lines and ISDN connectivity for majority of the branches.
United Bank of India has become the first organization in the world to have opted for a new path breaking technology that will lead to better IT infrastructure usage, faster network response, better manageability of devices and commercial savings. In this technology the IDU card goes into the NM slot of the Router and is called “IP VSAT Module”. It means a giant leap in the world of Networking and VSAT Communication for United Bank as it has already revolutionized the way the network was being used and managed. Also, this is now a case study in the networking world and is being studied by lots of organizations in general and BFSI industry in specific, around the globe.
Futuristic IT Planning :-
Shri T.M. Bhasin, Executive Director further shared with the media that to offer more value added services to the customers, United Bank is now proactively implementing the following IT projects :-
- Business Process Re-engineering and establishing Regional Processing Centres.
- Implementing Human Resources Management Software.
- Implementing IT based Financial Inclusion by issuance of Smart Biometric Cards to a larger number of customers.
- Putting in place data warehousing & data mining systems.
- Enhancing data quality of customers to operationalise Customer Relationship Management Software.
Total Business :-
Shri Bhasin shared with the media that total business of the Bank is expected to exceed Rs. 1.05 lac crore by the end of September 2009 with impressive profitability.
United Bank’s Maiden IPO is expected to hit the market in the 1st week of January, 2010. The IPO is expected to be for 50 million shares of Rs. 10/- face value at a reasonable premium. Government of India has already restructured and reduced the Equity Capital from Rs. 1532 crore to Rs. 266 crore, by allowing transfer of Rs. 1266 crore to Capital Reserve A/c. With this the Book Value of Rs. 10/- per share has gone upto Rs. 104/- per share (post restructuring) from Rs. 14/- per share (pre-Capital restructuring). The Bank has requested the Govt. of India to infuse an additional Tier I Capital of Rs. 800 crore in addition to Rs. 550 crore IPDI expected to be infused in 2009-10. With this, the Bank is confident to maintain CRAR of more than 12% till March 2012.
For More Details Contact :-
Shri Amitava Raychoudhuri
Cell No. 98315 62341
Office No. 033 2248 7732
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