CIMB must do more to protect it's integrity, reputation and brandname

It is common knowledge that banks must protect and uphold its integrity to the highest standards.

For banks, integrity is sacrosanct as they are the guardians of the people's monies and other wealth.

Whenever there is a crisis, banks must nip the issues in the bud quickly to conserve depositors and investors’ confidence.

CIMB Group Holdings Berhad however, continues to be embroiled in one controversy after another.

To recap, CIMB of late been battered by all sorts of allegations by its own customers for a technical glitch called "third party financial remittance service."

To recap, in March some 20 CIMB customers claimed that large sums of money were deducted from their respective savings accounts.

Those affected were the owners of accounts that were accidentally credited twice due to the bank’s third-party processing error.

In it's reply, CIMB said those who had their accounts debited were given notice as they had refused to entertain attempts by the bank to reach a fair resolution.

A lawyer Nazmi Mohd Zain reportedly said the overall sum debited from the 20-odd accounts belonging to his clients was more than RM1 million.

Consequently, netizens continued to vent their frustrations against CIMB on social media for the past several months claiming their accounts were "wiped" out by CIMB."

Bank Negara Malaysia had explicitly instructed CIMB that reclaiming the overpaid amounts must be done fairly and transparently but it is unclear if this ever took place, said FMT.

The bank reportedly denied claims of wrongdoing and vowed to defend itself.

The disgruntled customers had lodged reports with the police as well as Bank Negara Malaysia.

Separately, 650 CIMB depositors had also filed a class action against the bank for RM650 million due to the processing error.

To date, it is understood that their accounts are frozen and are in debt.

And now, the kerfuffle has entered into a new phase with the Minority Shareholders Watch Group or MSWG entering the fray.

MSWG had rebuked the bank for the technical glitch in “third party financial remittance service” and is set to query CIMB at its upcoming annual general meeting this Thursday, April 21, 2022.

It is understood that MSWG had prepared a set of questions on CIMB's reliability and integrity of the banking group’s information technology (IT) systems which has tarnished CIMB Bank Bhd and CIMB Islamic Bank Bhd’s standing as a reliable and reputable financial institution.

In January, the group identified errors that were related to a specific third-party financial remittance service which led to a group of customers receiving duplicate credits in their accounts.

CIMB has a lot of questions to answer such as how many customers/accounts were affected by these processing errors? 

The minority shareholders' activism group also wants to know what is the total amount involved?

MSWG wants to know what was the outcome of CIMB’s recovery engagement with customers and how much of the wrongly credited monies have been recovered by CIMB.

“What has gone wrong with CIMB’s transaction processing infrastructure that resulted in this error?," said MWSG.

• CIMB must also share what were Bank Negara Malaysia's directives to rectify its processing errors at both CIMB Bank and CIMB Islamic Bank.

• CIMB must also disclose to investors, shareholders and the rakyat on what are the remedial actions taken to address the processing errors.

• CIMB must also share what are it's plans to prevent similar errors from occurring in the future.

As Malaysia's second largest bank and a publicly listed concern, CIMB must do more to explain and rectify the situation.

Nagging issues such as these can erode investors and customers confidence both locally and internationally.

Banks have a direct correlation with the country's economy.

Thus it is imperative that CIMB does not delay in dealing with the glitch and be more transparent in handling and mitigating both minor and major crises.

Perhaps, it's group chief executive officer Datuk Abdul Rahman Ahmad who has been relatively quiet, should also be more out in the open to allay investors’ concerns? – DagangNews.com

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