KUALA LUMPUR: IT is exciting times ahead for Affin Bank Bhd as it embarks on the next phase of the AFFINITY Transformation Programme, which aims to make it the preferred bank for customers by 2020.
The five-year plan, which began in June last year, will see Affin hitting all eight pillars — which are target customer segments, delivery channels, products and solutions, operations, technology, people and organisation, performance management, and risk and compliance governance — of its new operation model.
“AFFINITY is not just a play of our name, but the word ‘affinity’ itself means ‘closer, more connected and more understanding’ of us and our customers.” said Affin group chief executive officer Kamarul Ariffin Mohd Jamil.
The programme, with an allocation of up to RM300 million, is set to be a game changer for the bank.
Kamarul said the programme had been designed to enable the bank to “leapfrog” its way forward.
When we started it in June last year, we were very well aware of the many areas that we needed to change, said Kamarul.
“Because our offerings are very traditional, it has allowed us to leapfrog from where we were.
“In creating AFFINITY, we came up with 32 key projects that focused on critical areas as well as the technological changes that are taking place in the banking industry.
“Of the 32 AFFINITY key projects, 25 have already been initiated. As of last month, 12 had been completed while 13 are ongoing,” he added.
AFFINITY is not limited to the 32 key projects as it also bears nine Quick Wins projects that are able to yield immediate capabilities.
“The Quick Wins refer to changes in the way we do business. We used to push all our products from just a branch, but under this initiative, we have established ‘hubs’. We will now concentrate on this specific product from that specific hub,” said Kamarul.
“This is a very effective way to do our business as we have seen our stock of undisbursed mortgage loans rising from RM600 million in 2015 to RM3 billion now, while the turn-around time has also improved relatively. Things like this are what we categorise as quick wins.”
Kamarul is well aware that at least by its asset standing, the bank is considerably small in comparison to other players such as Maybank Group and CIMB Group, but this is in no means a hindrance.
“The two things that may come across as disadvantages to us, which is our size and the fact that we are late to the financial technology (fintech) revolution, are actually in our favour,” he said.
Kamarul said 2018 would be the year of fintech for Affin Bank and, as such, it was in the final stages of rolling out an app as well as e-wallet application (app) for its customers.
“We will be introducing the mobile banking app as well as the Affin Pay app to our customers some time in 2018. We are already working with some fintech vendors and we are excited about this,” said Kamarul.