Ujjivan Small Finance Bank Commences Its Banking Operations

Ujjivan Financial Services Ltd, one of the leading microfinance companies in the country, today announced its transformation into a Small Finance Bank (SFB). They would begin with 5 pilot branches of Ujjivan SFB that will provide full service offerings.

In the next one month, the bank will comprehensively test its technology, channels, people and processes as part of its roll-out. Ujjivan SFB plans to extend these services across 457 branches in 24 states in a planned and phased manner over the next few months.

Commenting on the launch, Samit Ghosh, MD and CEO of Ujjivan Small Finance Bank Ltd said, “The launch of Ujjivan Small Finance Bank is a significant milestone. We started our journey as an NBFC in 2005 with a mission to empower the economically active low income group by providing them with a full range of financial services, which the SFB platform now enables us to do so.”

Ghosh said that Ujjivan SFB would offer a no minimum balance savings bank account with the full range of banking services and benefits using the latest technology to the unserved and underserved customers. “We will provide a whole host of benefits such as door-step & paperless banking, mobile, internet and phone banking, access to biometric ATMs and Aadhar enabled debit cards. These benefits are normally available only to premier customers of commercial banks.”

Ujjivan SFB would offer competitive and attractive rates of interest on Fixed Deposit and Recurring Deposit products in the range of 5.5 per cent to 8 per cent which is higher than the average rate of interest offered by most banks. The savings bank account is being offered with full range of benefits like accessing multiple channels such as biometric ATMs, RuPay debit card, phone, internet, and mobile banking at the market rate interest of 4 per cent.

The customers of Ujjivan SFB will have unlimited access to ATM transactions on Ujjivan’s ATM network and a total of 6 free transactions on other bank’s ATM networks, making this one of the highest free transactions currently offered by any bank.

Ujjivan SFB has committed an investment of Rs 400 crore in technology and digitisation in the next 5 years to fuel its growth. Ujjivan Small Finance Bank will bring in this service in a seamless manner through the internet and mobile banking option. Aadhar-enabled KYC and the simplified process will enable account opening in 5-7 minutes using biometric authentication on a hand-held device.

Ujjivan SFB has significantly focused on training and re-skilling the existing workforce to take up new, diverse and strategic roles in the bank. Of the current employee strength of approximately 10,000, close to 2,000 employees are new entrants with banking backgrounds.