7% rate offering helps DBS cross 1 million customer mark

Singaporean lender DBS today said the higher interest rate offering of 7 per cent has helped it add over 10 lakh savings bank customers in a year and affirmed that it is continuing with the aggressive posturing.
"Our savings bank accounts have crossed 1.2 million mark now because of the Digibank offering," its country chief executive Surojit Shome told PTI.
He said the bank was serving only high networth customers from its 12 branches earlier and the total number of accounts was under 1 lakh before it launched the Digibank one year ago.
Aked about the advantages of the rate offering -- which is even higher than the benchmark yield -- Shome said it introduces the bank to newer customers and the relationship so established can be utilised for selling other products.

Shome said the bank will continue with the aggressive offering despite no other commercial bank having such offers.
He said the bank can afford to continue with it because reliance on digital technologies reduces its cost of opening and maintaining an account.

While declining to disclose the deposit base created by such a big jump in accounts, Shome said the bank is sticking to its target of increasing the customer base to 4.5 million in the medium term.
Meanwhile, the foreign bank today announced tie-ups with life insurers Tata AIA Life, Birla Sun Life and Aviva Life, becoming the first lender to partner with three companies after the regulators liberalised the guidelines.

Shome said the bank has developed a proprietary platform through which the policies will be sold to customers, giving them an option to choose from.
The same platform can also be used for selling general and health insurance policies as well, he said.