Jacky Li, CFO, Kazi Mabasher Hossain, Director, Public Affairs and Communication Department and Md Khairul Anam, PR Manager of Huawei are seen at the launching ceremony of “Seeds for the Future” in the capital recently.

NCC Bank Limited recently signed a corporate agreement with Fair Distribution Limited.
As per the agreement, NCC Bank’s credit cardholders will get EMI facility on Samsung mobile handsets from all outlets and sub distributor’s outlets of Fair Distribution, said a press release.
Khaled Afzal Rahim, Head of Cards of NCC Bank Limited, and Md Ruhul Alam Al Mahbub, Managing Director of Fair Distribution Ltd signed the agreement on behalf of their respective organisations, in presence of Golam Hafiz Ahmed, Managing Director and CEO of the bank.

Mohammad Iqbal, EVP & head of Emerging Corporate and Special Programmes of Midland Bank( MDB), inaugurating ATM booth of MDB as the chief guest at Aganagar branch at Kearaniganj recently. Mostafizur Rahman, head of Cards, and Mir Rajib Faruk, AVP & head of Aganagar branch, were also present on the occasion

BB drafts a policy to administer lending and repayment.

Lack of a policy to repay default loans against credit card is taking a heavy toll on default clients who allegedly face threats and harassment from the issuing banks.

Treated as consumer financing, the credit card loans are charged with high interests by the banks that have no definite policy to recover the loans.

As a result, the cardholders face problem if they default as the banks do not allow the credit card loans to reschedule or any chance to pay the dues through installments favouring the clients.

Banks recover the money from credit card defaulters, allegedly issuing threat and harassing them physically and socially. 

However, Bangladesh Bank recently moved on issuing a policy over the credit card loans to solve the emerging problems. It has already made a draft policy in this regard. 

The policy includes a clause that any verbal or physical harassment or threats to customers, their family members, references or friends shall not be resorted in the recovery process. 

At the issuance of credit card, the issuer should properly communicate with the customer about the procedure of recovery in case of default payments.

But they should not engage in any activity against public interest and must use the principles of honesty and good health, said the policy.

The policy also prohibited banks from offering unsolicited loans to the customers based on the credit cards. 

It, however, did not offer any way forward for cardholders to come out of default situation by paying off loans. 

Though Bangladesh Bank discourages consumer financing, car loans and house building loans are allowed to reschedule when defaulted, said a senior executive of Bangladesh Bank. 

The cardholders, however, are treated as defaulter like other defaulters if failing to pay the dues in scheduled time, but they are not allowed to get installment or rescheduling facilities for paying off the loans, he said. 

He said credit card loans also can be rescheduled like other loans following the rescheduling policy because the nature of the credit card loan is similar to that of regular loans. 

But the banks are reluctant to go to the rescheduling process as the loan amount is not significant to them, he said. 

Banks would rather like to recover money allegedly by forcing clients instead of following legal procedure to avoid extra hassle for the little amount of credit card loans, he observed.

Staff Correspondent

The Bank of England has confirmed it is researching the financial risks of the UK leaving the EU after it "inadvertently" sent details of its work to a national newspaper.

A senior official sent an email about its confidential project on the issue to an editor at the Guardian newspaper.

A spokesman for the bank described the error as "unfortunate".

Prime Minister David Cameron has promised an in/out referendum on the UK's EU membership by the end of 2017.

The Guardian reports that the email indicates a small group of senior staff are to examine the economic effects of the UK leaving the EU under the authority of Sir Jon Cunliffe, who is the deputy director for financial stability.

The email also spells out that should anyone ask about the project - codenamed Project Bookend - the taskforce should say it concerns "a broad range of European economic issues", and not make any reference to the forthcoming referendum.
'Say no more'

The email, from Sir Jon Cunliffe's private secretary to four senior executives, was written on 21 May, the Guardian reported.

James Talbot, the head of the monetary assessment and strategy division, was also involved in Project Bookend, the paper said.

The email is quoted as saying: "Jon's proposal, which he has asked me to highlight to you, is that no email is sent to James's team or more broadly around the Bank about the project.

"James can tell his team that he is working on a short-term project on European economics in International [division] which will last a couple of months. This will be in-depth work on a broad range of European economic issues. Ideally he would then say no more."

The memo goes on to propose that questions from "other parties" about "whether this was a project to look at the referendum", should be given the answer, "that there is a lot going on in Europe in the next couple of months - pointing to some of the specific European economic issues (eg: Greece) that would be of concern to the Bank".
'Not sensible'

A statement from the bank said: "Today, information related to planned confidential Bank work on the potential implications of a renegotiation and national referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union made its way into the public domain, due to an internal email sent inadvertently to an external party.

"There are a range of economic and financial issues that arise in the context of the renegotiation and national referendum. It is one of the Bank's responsibilities to assess those that relate to its objectives.

"It is not sensible to talk about this work publicly, in advance. But as with work done prior to the Scottish referendum, we will disclose the details of such work at the appropriate time.

"While it is unfortunate that this information has entered the public domain in this way, the Bank will maintain this approach."

On Friday Mr Cameron met European counterparts for the first time since his general election victory, and admitted he was "not met with a wall of love" as he began diplomatic negotiations aimed at securing changes to the UK's relationship with Brussels.

At a summit in the Latvian capital Riga he conceded that securing a deal would take "patience and tenacity" and refused to ruled out campaigning for Britain to leave the EU if his renegotiation efforts failed.