Awards for Excellence 2018
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Africa has seen a seismic shift in its transaction banking operations in recent years. With many international banks retrenching, those who remain are bedding in and extending their reach across the continent.
Citi has its feet on the ground across the continent, giving it a reach and stability that is difficult to match by either regional or the international competitors.
Citi has moved to align itself with the 2020 Vision growth plans adopted by many of the continent’s central banks. Under Peter Crawley, treasury and trade solutions head, sub-Saharan Africa, CIti has also aligned its business with the increasing trade flows in the region. Recognizing the importance of a single channel of support, it has focused on developing and improving its Trade Services Hub.
As the continent is known for being an early adopter of fintech, it serves as a good testing ground for further advances. Earlier this year, Citi launched two robotic process automation (RPA) applications in east Africa that will automate the movement of financial information between the bank and its clients. Through the use of bots, the bank has been able to speed up payment cycles and reduce errors, while also improving reporting and reconciliation. It is looking to launch a third pilot RPA this year.
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| Peter Crawley |
Payments and collections across Africa have seen a boost from the expansion of the Citi virtual card account to cover travel, procurement and expense management. The system allows for payments to be made to a virtual card number, providing clarity about the client and the payments being made. In direct response to requests from clients for better reconciliation tools, Citi has launched Payer ID. The solution assigns individual debtors with unique identifiers to allow tracking of the origin of a payment. This greatly improves the reconciliation of flows by matching the funds to the associated customer number.
Citi has hosted client forums to keep its clients up to date with innovations and cyber threats, bringing together a panel of treasurers from the continent’s largest multinationals. Correspondent banks were also brought together last July to attend the Africa Banks Forum as part of the wider focus on providing education and enhancing core competencies.
