MUMBAI: State Bank of India (SBI) chairman Dinesh Khara has said that, despite localised containment, the second wave of the pandemic will have an impact on the economy this year.
The bank is meeting the challenges by increasing its focus on digital and maintaining momentum on stressed asset recovery.
Addressing shareholders at SBI’s annual general meeting, Khara said that the bank has already achieved a high level of digitisation with the share of alternate channels going up to 93% from 91% last year.
“In the current financial year, the bank will continue to accelerate its digital agenda,” said Khara.
This involves increasing the scope and reach of Yono.
For individual borrowers, Yono now has pre-approved personal loans, pre-approved pension loan, and insta top-up for express credit.
For businesses, the Yono platform will soon provide a fully digital trade finance solution.
On stressed assets, shareholders sought information on how much SBI stands to recover as a result of the enforcement action on Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi.
But the bank did not provide any specific number.
“We also embraced digital readiness to meet our customers virtually and organised over 800 e-townhall meetings for our MSME clientele,” he said.
Khara said that with 1.8 crore followers on Facebook and 42 lakh followers on Twitter, the bank had the biggest social media presence among lenders globally.
The bank will also provide doorstep banking for customers who cannot visit the branch and this will include 10 services like the launch of the doorstep-like account statement, cash withdrawal facility, and life certificate submission for pensioners.
In the branch, the bank has introduced the concept of floor managers in over 2,400 branches for superior customer experience.