NATIONAL Commercial Bank Jamaica Limited (NCBJ) said it is deploying more technology to fight fraud, signalling to its customers that it is addressing their concerns about skulduggery that has left the bank with a black eye. The bank also said its recent decision to reduce the daily transaction limits will have no impact on the majority of its customers.

“For the vast majority of our customers the previous limit of half a million dollars could wipe out weeks and months of income for them so, to protect them, we dropped that limit to $150,000 — which is an amount that more than 80 per cent of our customers never transfer more than that,” Bruce Bowen, chief executive officer of NCBJ, said in response to a shareholder query about the reduction in the daily transaction limits at his company’s virtual annual general meeting (AGM) on Friday.

On February 1 NCBJ reduced the daily limit for most online transfers to third parties from $500,000 to $150,000, in response to rising cases of individuals wiping out the savings of many Jamaicans. The change does not apply to business customers, and personal customers who need a higher limit can ask the bank to increase it to up to $2 million — a process which now takes two business days but the bank wants to cut this to a few hours.

Limitations on transaction amounts aside, Bowen said the bank has been working to plug the gaps that lead to fraud and it is also using technology to get better at catching fraudsters. It said since November, fraud cases have declined significantly following the discontinuation of text message notifications from the bank so as to stop smishing attempts from fraudsters who use these text messages to deceive its clients into giving them access to their accounts, which are then wiped out after.

NCB Jamaica CEO Bruce Bowen

“We’re working on technology that would, on a safer basis, get texts out to new clients on certain types of transactions if they could verify a transaction before it is actually put through. We’re working with our technology partners and other banks to look at the best way to both protect our customers and give our customers the tools in order to manage the level of risk that they are facing,” the NCBJ CEO explained. He added that with technology, NCBJ has also reduced fraud investigations from a month to two weeks.

While these moves are seen as restrictive for customers, Sheree Martin reminded everyone that the decisions were taken in the interest of protecting the customer base. Although it has pushed back a self-serve education campaign for its customers, Martin highlighted that the bank is working on improving the digital facilities for potential customers to open accounts online using electronic know your customer (eKYC) tools.

“Our goal is to make sure that process becomes just as seamless as we find for existing customers by having that validation and verification done with the help of technology. The truth is, we do find customers still like to go to the branch to open an account. Even in branch, we are making steps to ensure that you can open the account digitally on a tablet,” Martin added.

Lynk to launch debit card

These moves are also being reflected by TFOB (2021) Limited, operator of the
Lynk mobile app, which will be launching a virtual Visa debit card later this year, subject to Bank of Jamaica approval. This is in conjunction with the planned addition of Western Union as a remittance option, along with its already existing MoneyGram offering for its 260,000 plus clients.

“We’re very encouraged by the performance of Lynk; Lynk has made a lot of progress on the remittance side. Particularly last quarter, it saw its highest number of remittances coming through the
Lynk platform — and that’s just with its initial partnership with MoneyGram. We’re in the final stages of our partnership agreement with Western Union; we expect to release access to the public for Western Union in this quarter. We’re in the final stages of testing, we’re seeking BOJ approval. As soon as we get that, in terms of the [virtual] Visa debit product, that will be released within
Lynk,” responded NCBJ Vice-President of Payments and Digital Channels Danielle Cameron-Duncan on
Lynk, which now falls under her purview.

NCBFG’s first-quarter results saw its net revenue from banking and investment activities up four per cent to $19.51 billion with its net revenue from insurance activities moving up 85 per cent to $15 billion, which now reports under the new accounting standard. Consolidated net profit increased 170 per cent to $5.97 billion, with $3.08 billion attributable to shareholders. NCBFG’s board will consider a dividend payment on February 16.

NCBFG’s stock price increased four per cent on Friday to $68.68, which left it with a market capitalisation of $174.81 billion.