Co-operative Bank of Kenya has bagged the 2020 ‘Bank of the Year in Kenya’ award. The award was scooped courtesy of the Financial Times of London on the increased use of digital services.
During this year’s FT Banker 2020 Awards-, an annual fete that recognizes banks who have excelled in various categories such as technology and efficiency, Co-operative Bank won.
“As Co-op Bank implements its digitization strategy plans, it is enjoying gains from increased efficiency and enhanced digital offerings to its customers,” said the Financial Times.
According to organizers of the fete, the bank has been riding on deepened digital offerings such as M-Co-op and e-credit that enhance efficient delivery of services to customers.
The bank recently said that almost 90% of its transaction volumes are currently being completed on online digital channels such as M-Co-op and Kawa Jirani platforms.
Already, Ksh.42 billion was disbursed through the M-Co-op mobile wall during the nine-month period ending September 2020, an increase of Ksh. 14.4 billion compared to the same period last year.
Co-op chief executive Gideon Muriuki said, “We continue to actively engage our customers to support them through this period, by re-aligning the servicing of facilities, funding, and transactional needs as the situation unfolds.”
The award comes at a time banks are moving from paper to paperless banking through digitization of their services.
With this, customers will only be needed to present the National Identification Card when opening bank accounts as the rest of the information will already be with the bank.
Apart from winning the ‘Bank of the Year in Kenya’, the bank was also recognized for supporting customers in coping with the effects brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ksh.46 billion was set aside by the bank to help customer impacted by the pandemic the has continued to ravage countries around the globe. This is happening even as the number of new COVID-19 cases in the country continue to rise.