Time: October 16, 2013 Source: Modern Gold Express
“Ningbo Branch has 13 business outlets across the municipality. Except Yuyao Sub-branch, although the other 12 sub-branches all encountered some problems during the attack of Typhoon ‘Fitow', their normal business operation were not affected. Yuyao Sub-branch was hit hard by the typhoon, but with emergency repair in full sail, all the 13 business outlets under the branch could provide normal service to the outside by October 14.”
Under the influence of typhoon “Fitow”, the 11 counties (cities and districts) under Ningbo Municipality including 119 towns and townships were stricken by the disaster to different degrees, which resulted in serious economic losses. To implement the spirit in the reply of General Secretary Xi Jinping to the disaster relief and resistance of Zhejiang and put into effect the arrangements of the CPC Ningbo Municipal Committee and Ningbo Municipal Government as well as the regulatory authorities at all levels, Industrial Bank (IB) Ningbo Branch, adhering to the guidelines of “draining waterlog, eliminating risks, relieving disasters, and restoring production”, actively assumed its social responsibilities, assembled all forces to join the disaster resistance and relief cause, exerted itself to guarantee the financial service demands of disaster-stricken enterprises and residents, and assisted them to restore their production and life as soon as possible, composing a “disaster relief song” with its own actions.
The chapter of “disaster resistance and self relief”
Boost outlets to restore business operation as soon as possible
In confrontation with the severe disaster, IB Ningbo Branch established an emergency typhoon and flood prevention leading group urgently on October 8. Wang Dengxing, president of the branch, served as the group leader, and directors of all sub-branches and departments as group members. Meanwhile, the branch immediately to launch the emergency response plan and issued the “Circular of IB Ningbo Branch on the Disaster Prevention and Relief against Typhoon ‘Fitow'”, in which it required the presidents of all sub-branches to enforce the “head-based” responsibility system, take it as the foremost task to guarantee the personal safety of every employee all the time, and keep close attention to the movement of typhoon and possible secondary disasters.
On October 11, in order to reinforce the support to the disaster relief and production restoration with financial services and ensure the general public to restore their production and life as soon as possible, IB Ningbo Branch established the disaster relief and production restoration leading group upon its first convenience, which is mainly responsible for studying and working out solutions for disaster relief and production restoration, planning such solutions as whole, giving priority to central tasks, and enforcing different policies in different situations, so as to ensure that the cause of disaster relief and production restoration could be pushed ahead effectively.
During the attack of typhoon, Wang Dengxing, president of IB Ningbo Branch, led a group of employees to carry out emergency investigation over sub-branches in the urban area of Ningbo, dispatched 16 disaster prevention and relief groups consisting of 93 people and over 20 vehicles to investigate and reinforce the 13 outlets and branch building across the municipality. With emergency response preparations, the branch lost no time to handle hidden security troubles discovered, thus avoiding events of injuries.
During the attack of typhoon, IB Ningbo Branch had nine self-service outlets suspended providing service due to the causes including water intrusion, power failure, and lighting failure. With emergency repair in full sail, seven had been restored to provide normal service by October 14, ensuring the financial service needs of surrounding residents.
The chapter of “financial service”
Satisfying the financial service needs of citizens
In order to meet the financial service needs of citizens, IB Ningbo Branch joined the cause of disaster relief and production restoration with its actual actions, e.g. ensuring availability of financial service at outlets, adjusting credit extension direction in a timely manner, and carrying out in-depth investigation on a door-to-door basis.
Ensuring availability of financial service at outlets. IB Ningbo Branch dared to assume its social responsibilities and adhere to the principle of “centering on customers”. Not only did it guarantee the provision of quality service to customers handling businesses at outlets, but also reminded customer of travel safety actively by way of communication means including short message and telephone.
Timely adjustment of credit extension direction. Following the principles of “giving priority to disaster relief, production restoration and people's livelihood”, IB Ningbo Branch increased and accelerated its credit input for flood resistance and disaster relief with a view to meeting the financial service needs of customers. In choosing the regions for lending support to their post-disaster reconstruction, the branch put its credit extension stress on the hard-hit regions including Yuyao, Fenghua, Jinzhou, and Jiangbei, ensuring the priority to be given to disaster relief. In terms of areas for credit extension, it focused on the fields of public utilities that guarantee the normal production and life of residents including construction of infrastructure, control and construction of riverways and water network, post-disaster relocation of residents, reconstruction of old towns and transformation of shanty towns, as well as water, electricity and gas supplies, so as to guarantee the priority to be given to production restoration and people's livelihood. Meanwhile, it also gave priority to support the production restoration of small- and medium-sized enterprises which were stricken by the disaster seriously. By October 14, IB Ningbo Branch has accumulatively granted loans of RMB 152 million to support the post-disaster production restoration.
In-depth investigation on a door-to-door basis. IB Ningbo Branch actively mobilized customer managers to carry out investigation in the disaster-stricken areas and implemented the support program of “different policies in different situations,” with a view to helping disaster-hit residents and enterprises to reconstruct their homes and restore production. By October 14, the branch has dispatched 15 investigation groups consisting of 54 investigators to carry out investigation over 439 customers applying for loans. Of them, 31 were confirmed as disaster-stricken customers, who suffered the losses of RMB 423 million. In this way, it tried to learn the situation of disaster as soon as possible and take measures for disaster relief and production restoration.
The chapter of “post-disaster reconstruction”
Inclined support based on a variety of policies
In order to support the post-disaster reconstruction campaign in a better way, IB Ningbo Branch communicated with and reported to IB Head Office the situation in a timely manner with a view to winning over inclined policies. In the meantime, it also applied to the Head Office for increasing the scale of special loans, opening green channel for examination and approval, and relaxing the tolerance over non-performing loans. The Head Office paid great attention to the disaster situation of Ningbo region and promised to provide policy support.
Application for increasing the scale of special loans by RMB 2 billion. Now, IB Ningbo Branch has applied to IB Head Office for increasing the scale of special loans by RMB 2 billion for post-disaster reconstruction, to guarantee the normal operation of disaster-stricken enterprises whose loans become mature and request not to withdraw loans and delay the extension of loans to disaster-stricken enterprises.
Application for opening green channel for examination and approval. It is impressing to some extent to support the post-disaster relief and reconstruction itself, in particular, to support the projects in the areas including post-disaster production restoration and relocation of disaster-stricken residents. It is required to arrange a large amount of off-plan funds in a short period of time. For such projects, IB Ningbo Branch arranged a professional marketing team for handling relevant loans to improve the quality and efficiency, so as to ensure that the support funds could be granted to relevant governmental agencies at the earliest possible time for post-disaster reconstruction. Meanwhile, it applied to the Investment Banking Department of Head Office to open a green channel for examination and approval for supporting the post-disaster reconstruction projects, so as to give priority in accepting relevant projects, accelerate the process of examination and approval, and focus support on key projects.
Application for relaxing the tolerance over non-performing loans, to small-sized enterprises in particular. Considering that this typhoon might lead some hard-hit enterprises to face financial difficulties, especially those small- and mini-sized enterprises with limited resistance to risks, embitter their living burdens and make potential risks rise in the region, the branch has applied to the Head Office for lifting its tolerance over non-performing loans, in particular to small- and mini-sized enterprises, with a view to alleviating the pressure of customers and taking further measures to support and assistance.