Management of Consolidated Bank Ghana (CBG) has disclosed the bank’s readiness to commence full payment of funds to depositors of collapsed Microfinance, Microcredit, Savings and Loans as well as Finance House Companies.
The full payment of funds, which took effect from yesterday, was announced by the President in his fourth State of the Nation Address (SONA) last Thursday.
In his address to Parliament, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akuffo-Addo, said his government had made arrangements to pay all depositors of failed financial institutions, including customers of defunct Microfinance Company, DKM.
He stressed that the government had made available an extra five billion Ghana cedis to pay affected depositors, 100 percent of their deposits.
Confirming the President’s statement, Managing Director (MD) of CBG, Daniel Wilson Addo, indicated that government had made available to CBG a combination of cash and bonds totalling five billion cedis to fully settle outstanding depositor claims of these resolved institutions as well as that of the 39 Micro Credit institutions in official liquidation.
“To ensure that the affected customers are well served, there are clear modalities,” Mr Addo explained.
According to him, the Bank will start by first paying depositors; whose claims have already been validated and therefore advised depositors, whose claims are yet to be validated to exercise patience.
Mr Addo assured them that their claims will also be paid as soon as the validation is completed by the Receiver.
He said SMS would be sent to depositors when their payments were due by the Receiver, adding that there was no need for them to go to the banking halls if they had not received notification by SMS, to come for their funds.
Explaining the modalities for the payment of the outstanding depositor obligations, Mr Addo said “based on information to be provided by the Receiver on depositors, CBG will open new accounts for all depositors whose claim(s) had been validated and agreed in the receiverships of the resolved companies, and the SMS messaging that would be sent, would communicate the account number and the amount due each depositor.”
The CBG MD added that depositors could access their funds at any CBG branch, “but should come along with valid national identification documents such as a Driver’s License, Voter ID card or Passport.
Mr Addo said Corporate Depositors would however, be fully settled through a combination of cash and bonds.
He assured the affected depositors that it would continue to work with the Receiver validate the remaining claims and will communicate the status of depositor claims submitted within the claim deadline period.
Mr Addo said every effort would be made to pay all depositors and urged them to co-operate with the bank for a smooth and successful payment process.“We will treat the depositors as our customers and give them the best of service as we stand with them throughout the entire process,” he said.
