Double win for ComBank from Asiamoney magazine

Adjudged Sri Lanka’s ‘Best Bank for SMEs’ and ‘Best Bank for CSR’

The Commercial Bank of Ceylon has won the awards of ‘Best Bank for Small and Medium Enterprises’ and ‘Best Bank for Corporate Social Responsibility’ for the second year in a row from Asiamoney Magazine, the top-ranking publication and authority on banking and capital markets in Asia.

The award for ‘Best Bank for SMEs’ recognises Commercial Bank’s efforts in identifying the importance of small and medium enterprises to the economy of the country and the products and services put in place to empower this segment, while the ‘Best Bank for Corporate Social Responsibility’ award is a tribute to the Bank’s nationally- significant contributions via its CSR Trust, to the spheres of education, healthcare, environment and community development.

The Bank clinched the first award for its persistent efforts to support small and medium businesses (SMEs) affected by the pandemic in 2020, with among others, the disbursement of a substantial amount in COVID-19 support loans by the close of the year under multiple relief schemes to provide working capital loans to pandemic affected businesses, including loans provided under the Central Bank mandated programme as well as the Bank’s own support schemes.

The Bank launched ‘Arunella’ – a Financial Support Scheme that included 12 initiatives designed to assist and provide concessions to SMEs. This included a moratorium scheme, relief to non-performing borrowers, reduction of lending rates, concessions for Credit Card holders, concessions and fee waivers, and free digital services, to name a few. It also included two special loan schemes, one for SMEs affected by COVID-19 and the other the ‘Dirishakthi COVID-19 Support Loan’ scheme to assist micro enterprises disrupted by the pandemic.