After the mechanism is approved, 500,000 new accounts of operating banks will receive cash support

Dam Press:

The operational banks, under the supervision of the Central Bank of Syria, have made great efforts to implement the government’s directives to restructure support into thoughtful and gradual monetary support and rationalize public spending, aiming to provide support to those who deserve it in an efficient and equitable manner.
The Central Bank of Syria confirmed in a report that it has taken many measures to help provide cash support to those who are entitled to it, and issued decisions and instructions to enhance financial access and banking awareness, aimed at enabling citizens to easily open bank accounts for all financial transactions, especially current financial transactions to receive support amounts after the mechanism was approved.
According to the central bank, the number of newly “opened and activated” bank accounts by operational banks reached about 500,000 accounts, while various decisions were taken, including extending banking working hours until 6 pm and working on Saturdays from 9 am to 4 pm, limiting working hours to only additional formalities for customers to open bank accounts or activate dormant accounts so that they activate them correctly during official working hours, and working to simplify the process of opening accounts and speed up the process as much as possible.
The Central Bank of Syria also follows up on the results of its decisions in this regard by tracking and reporting the details of new and active accounts on a weekly basis, and conducts field visits to understand the progress of work on the ground. It has determined the fees associated with opening bank accounts and bank cards, and has asked banks to reduce the burden on customers as much as possible.

In terms of accelerating and simplifying the wider promotion and provision of financial services by banks at lower costs and with simpler procedures, the Central Bank gave the necessary approvals to the contracts signed by several banks with internal money transfer companies for implementation and issued a decision on allowing banks to enter into contracts with natural or legal persons with appropriate commercial registration to allow customers to make withdrawals and deposits from their bank accounts under specific controls.
The central bank also allowed microfinance banks to open offices in large commercial complexes, “shopping malls”, flexible counter service companies, universities, citizen service centers and any similar places to carry out specific banking activities and provide banking services to customers, especially opening current accounts, preparing loan and financing documents and marketing banking services, but acceptance of deposits and receipt of loan amounts disbursed remain the jurisdiction of independent banking offices and branches.
As for the coordination of the exchange of cash support with other relevant parties, the Central Bank continues to coordinate with the Ministry of Communications and Technology to prepare detailed data on personal bank accounts, start to build a database for the bank account platform, and deliver it according to the content announced by the Central Bank to the platform development company, so that when it is really ready, in addition to participating in the project of building the cash support platform, it can also complete the necessary procedures for launching the platform. Work is being coordinated with the Ministry of Communications.