Punjab National Bank (also referred to as PNB) is one of the leading banks in India. It offers a wide variety of banking services, like corporate and personal banking, financing of trade, industrial finance, agricultural finance and international banking. The major customers of PNB are Indian conglomerates, exporters, medium and small industrial units, non-resident Indians and multinational companies.
Punjab National Bank was incorporated in the year 1895 in Lahore (British India). Since its great beginning over hundred years ago, the bank has grown in reputation. It has become one of the leading banking institutions in India. PNB is the second largest PSU bank in India. It has dominant presence in north India. It is headquartered in New Delhi, India.
PNB has taken initiative mainly in the field of computerization to keep it up to date with changing times by providing its customers more economical, efficient and fast service. It has computerized all its branches. The Bank has also launched the concept of "Any Time, Any Where banking" i.e. 24 hours banking facilities through the use of Centralized Banking Solution (CBS) and more than 2000 offices have been already brought under its range.
System Prior to the Introduction of EPS
Punjab National Bank (also referred to as PNB) is India's one of the leading banks and provides a broad variety of banking services. Punjab National Bank is serving through 3.5 crore clients through 4062 branches and 447 extension counters
PNB generates large amount of documents and reports related to customer. For any new banking services requested by the customer a new application form is created which contains all his details. This application form is the main document containing all information about the customer, for the purpose to provide requested service to the customer and settlement of legal disputes.
The company had to retrieve the original hard copy of the application to access any important information related to the client. The regular procedure was to take out a page from the entire set of documents of original application forms. This original form was either photocopied or used and then kept back with the original forms. This led to original papers being misplaced or left them in a poor condition, due to constant wear and tear. Many a times the original documents were missing and at times, the photocopy also got stapled to a wrong application form.
Problems Faced by Punjab National Bank
• Punjab National Bank generates a lot of physical documents for their existing clients as well as new clients. Management of these documents (Sorting, Indexing and Filing etc) was a very hectic and time consuming process for them.
• The regular procedure followed by them was to take out a page required from the entire set of documents of original application forms and then work on it. This led to original papers being misplaced or left them in a poor state, due to constant wear and tear.
• For searching or locating any document / file was a tough and time consuming task for the staff involved in this process.
• Since paper based files/documents were accessible to each and every person, they were liable to be make changes in original documents, and resulted sharing of any internal information and data with any unauthorized person.
• Physical documents were more likely to get damage with time, moisture, rodents etc.
• Also there was another big problem of disaster recovery. It was very difficult to get back all data once lost.
Implementation of CBS or EPS in Punjab National Bank
Internet Banking or CBS
Customers use the Internet to get access of their account using their user id and password and to undertake banking transactions. It basically involves furnishing of facilities like retrieving accounts, transferring funds, and purchasing financial products or services online. It is also called as "transactional'' online banking.
Traditional Banking V/S E- Banking
Traditional Banking --> in traditional banking, the customers have to smite the bank branch to execute the various basic banking functions viz., enquiry about account, transferring funds, money withdrawing etc.
E-Banking - E-banking provides empowerment to the clients to carry out the basic banking transactions without going anywhere i.e. being at their homes or at their offices through desktops or laptops across the global through electronic media. This is also known as anytime, anywhere banking.
Models of E-Banking
Effective implementation of E-banking and enhancement of the level of technology suggest following E-models:
Complete Centralized Solution (CCS)
High Tech Banks within banks
Cluster Approach
CCS or CBS
It is an ideal branch network model which facilitates E-banking activities to be implemented efficiently and uniformly. Within this model, PNB has to fork-up web-server and the required software like FineDocs which is connected to the main server of the PNB. The customers of PNB can use the web server for their day-to-day basic banking activities like transactions using any standard browser at any location.
CBS in PNB
PNB has more than 4500 branches and offices that bring the PNB to our entrance. More than 2400 offices of PNB are managed by the Centralized Banking Solution or CBS Network.
A deprivation for centralized banking solution and to meet changing requirements prompted PNB to go computerized and this led to the foundation of CBS in all PNB branches in the entire big cities like Pune, Delhi, Ahmadabad, Chandigarh, Gurgaon, Hyderabad, Jalandhar, Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai, Ludhiana, Bangalore and Noida. Internet Banking facilities are given to all clients in the CBS branches by PNB. The official website of Punjab National Bank also has a branch and ATM locator to facilitate its customers to get easy access to bank and ATM.PNB has been focusing to expand its operations outside India and has already identified some of the appearing economies which provide huge business potential.
PNB also provides Internet Banking services in India for large companies and for individuals.
Internet Banking facilities are accessible through all Branches of the PNB networked under Centralized Banking Solutions. It provides 24 hours, 365 days banking services right from the PC of the user, Internet Banking provides world class banking services like anytime, anywhere retrieval to account, and statement of account, online information of deposits, loans overdraft account, complete details of transactions, etc.
PNB also provides Online Payment Facility for railway reservation. Through internet banking, it provides facility to its customers to pay their telephone, insurance, mobile, electricity, and other bills from anywhere and anytime from their PC or laptop without going to physical offices.
Implementation of CBS in Punjab National Bank's patronized six Regional Rural Banks with more than 1400 branches.
Punjab National Bank implemented Central banking solutions successfully in 6 Regional Rural Banks in only 12 months and it was done before the schedule deadline. It led to improved centralized generation of MIS reports, customer service, desired growth, better housekeeping, etc through the implementation of CBS in RRBs. These branches now have more time to explore new business opportunities through the automation of front-end services of banks. Anytime, Anywhere Banking, Internet banking solutions, Automated Teller Machines, etc are also offered to the clients. After the implementation of Central banking solutions, total gross profit has increased to approximately Rs 229 Crore from Rs 175 Crore. This project was implemented entirely utilising the internal resources of PNB which included hardware, software, network, and server and information security infrastructure.
Benefits of implementation of EPS or CBS to Punjab National Bank
Documents Security: FineDocs system facilitates access on all the records / documents through a user name and a password based on the role of employees.
Easy Sharing and Collaboration: All documents are now stored in FineDocs with proper access control. This way authorized users are able to view /refer / share and modify the documents as per the requirements.
Saves Duplication and Photocopying Cost: Since electronic documents could be shared among several users at the same time, there is no need to photocopy the original documents for sharing, thus resulting in a huge saving on the photocoping of documents.
Disaster Management: FineDocs provides a great all-in-one solution for the protection of documents of Punjab National Bank from disasters like Natural & accidental calamities etc. This system provides fully fledged backup and restore facility.
Audit Trail: FineDocs has a feature by which each and every operation, event performed by the user like, user logins into the system, action done etc were recorded with the time, thus increasing the accountability and save time and money.
Saved Courier Cost: FineDocs System provides an option to email documents both within and outside the office, thus cutting down on courier cost. As all these documents are in non-editable TIFF format, users are in relief that they will not be tampered and are as safe as any other printed document.
Round the clock banking: Bank is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days in a year.
Convenient Banking: The convenient banking opens with PNB net banking facility. Now, customers do not need to wait for another day to carry out a transaction once the bank branches close for the day. Internet banking is available 24 hours a day and seven days a week.
Profitable Banking: In 2010, PNB was the most efficient and profitable public sector bank with RoA and RoE of 1.4% and 25.5% respectively excluding profit from stake sales.
Quality Banking: Credit rating agency ICRA has assigned best credit quality rating to Punjab National Bank's Rs 1,000 crore long-term bonds. The assigned rating 'LAAA" took into account the strong franchise of PNB resulting in low cost stable deposit base and a growing credit portfolio.
Speed Banking: It benefits customers by processing 'one off' internet and phone payments in hours rather than days.
Service Banking: Clients can now manage their funds and accounts more effectively and efficiently by online services offered by PNB.
Conclusions
The implementation of CBS at Punjab National Bank helped it in many ways. It reduced lots of work, saved time, money in duplication and photocopying of documents. It also facilitates Punjab National Bank's clients to work at their home or offices. An offsite disaster recovery facility provided by the bank has confirmed that PNB abides by to its famous tagline, "the name you can BANK upon!" It also led to achieve improved customer service, desired growth, centralized generation of MIS reports, better housekeeping, etc through the implementation of CBS in the Regional Rural Banks. It also helped in customization, parameterization, and handling of innovative system redesign. Branches now have got more time to explore new business opportunities because of the automation of front-office businesses.
