NCB Financial Group (NCBFG) said it is working with telecommunications providers to reinforce data links to its automated banking machines (ABMs), a direct response to Hurricane Melissa severing connectivity and leaving thousands unable to access cash.

The move to harden its network follows a recovery that NCB executives have hailed as a success in nearly every other aspect. Speaking at Friday’s investor briefing, they revealed that all branches were reopened within days of the Category 5 storm, and approximately 80 per cent of its ABMs in the worst-hit parishes were physically intact and operational. However, the crisis pinpointed a critical weakness: the fragile “last-mile” communication lines connecting these machines to the bank’s core systems.

Bruce Bowen, CEO of National Commercial Bank Jamaica (NCBJ), identified this as the top priority for improvement. “The biggest single challenge was communication,” Bowen stated when asked about lessons learnt from the difficulties consumers faced to access cash from machines in the aftermath of the hurricane.

“We are seriously looking at how we can build more redundancy into the communication infrastructure.” The goal is to ensure that in a future storm, any ABM that is physically intact and stocked with cash will be able to connect and operate.

Solutions under consideration include satellite links and more resilient fibre optic routing. “We are working with our partners on the telecommunications side to make sure that the fibre isn’t vulnerable from a damage perspective,” Bowen added.

The vulnerability was starkly revealed in towns like Black River in St Elizabeth, the area dubbed “ground zero” from the impact of the hurricane. “We have three ABMs that came through fine [in Black River]. The problem is there’s no connectivity, and the ability to get cash to them is limited,” Bowen explained. He credited the physical survival of NCB’s machines to “spectacular” pre-storm preparations like boarding and sandbagging, noting that he believed they were the only ones in the area to have physically survived the storm.

Group CEO Robert Almeida framed the communication issue as indicative of broader success. “The reason we’re talking about communication is because everything else worked,” Almeida said, prompting Bowen to elaborate that the ABMs were “ready to go” and awaited only the restoration of data links.

Branches and Cloud Provided Critical Back-up

A two-year-old decision to restore over-the-counter cash services across its branch network provided a critical lifeline for NCB after Hurricane Melissa crippled its automated banking machine network. In a phased reopening, key branches in Kingston and Mandeville were operational by Friday, October 31; critically affected locations in the west, including Negril, followed by Wednesday, November 5.

“That’s allowing us over the counter and in branches to be able to provide our customers with cash,” Bowen said, offering a crucial alternative where digital connectivity failed.

While last-mile links buckled, the bank’s core systems—newly migrated to the cloud—never went down. This back-end resilience ensured that online banking remained stable and that any restored connection immediately brought an ABM or merchant point-of-sale terminal back online.

A Race to Reopen

The focus on the last mile came only after NCB had cleared its first critical hurdle: restoring physical access. This massive logistical effort provided a vital lifeline amid industry-wide chaos.

The experience delivered a crucial, sobering insight. Despite the bank’s extensive preparations, the storm exposed a fundamental vulnerability. As Bowen had cautioned, when a Category 5 hurricane with 185 mph winds strikes, some failures are inevitable. For NCB and the wider sector, the most persistent challenge was not the force of the wind itself, but the fragility of the final, critical link to the customer.

NCB headquarters, the central hub coordinating recovery efforts after Hurricane Melissa disrupted banking services.