Commercial Bank scores double win at Asian Banker’s awards

Commercial Bank has won two awards at The Asian Banker’s Transaction Banking Awards 2018, Middle East and Africa.
The Bank took home the award for “Best Cash Management Bank in Qatar” for the third year in a row and won the “Best Transaction Banking service in Qatar” for the first time.
The awards demonstrate Commercial Bank’s strength in cash management and strategy of investing in Transaction Banking service solutions.
The Asian Banker’s Transaction Banking Awards is the “most rigorous, prestigious and transparent” annual awards programme in the region. It recognises leadership in the cash management, trade finance and payments industries amongst international financial institutions in the Asia Pacific as well as the Middle East and Africa. Judged by an international board of advisers, applicants were subject to a stringent assessment process.
Commercial Bank Group CEO Joseph Abraham said, “Leading Transaction Banking in Qatar is a key part of our five-year strategic plan and we continually invest in our people, and in new technologies and processes to achieve this strategic objective. “Receiving two awards from a renowned awarding body is validation of the capabilities of Commercial Bank Innovation Services (CBIS), our in-house innovation and technology arm based in the QFC, in developing best-in-class Transaction Banking products and services, including cash management. Our investment in CBIS gives us a competitive advantage through the application of technologies such as robotics, artificial intelligence and analytics, together with the ability to roll new solutions to suit our customers’ needs in a short space of time.”
Commercial Bank executive general manager and head of Wholesale Banking Raju Buddhiraju said, “Commercial Bank is once again the market leader for cash management and Transaction Banking in Qatar, and we are delighted to receive independent recognition by winning these awards.
“At Commercial Bank, we pride ourselves in offering our corporate customers industry-leading digital solutions to support their business goals by providing services that are cost effective, straight forward, and secure.”
Commercial Bank’s Transaction Banking Department has built strong relationships with Qatari corporates. In 2017, the bank became the first bank in the country to offer “direct debit” to any utility company (Qatar Cool) for online bill payments, and the first bank in Qatar to offer a bulk bill payment service to Ooredoo.
The bank has also introduced an electronic cheque solution, Remote Cheque Deposit service for the corporates for faster cheque processing and collection. It also has an in-house IT team that can create technology customisations to meet customer requirements, integrate customer enterprise resource planning (ERP) with bank systems for secured transaction processing and auto-reconciliation.
The awards for “Best Cash Management Bank in Qatar” and “Best Transaction Banking service in Qatar” in 2018 add to several recent awards that underline Commercial Bank’s objectives of creativity, innovation, and client experience as part of its five-year strategic plan.
Most notably, Commercial Bank was awarded the “Best Bank in Qatar” from Global Finance magazine on the sidelines of the 2018 Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group.