Last month, Bank of Kigali migrated to a new core banking system to among others accelerate the lenders digital transformation ambitions, as part of efforts to improve service delivery. The development, officials at the Bank say, bring with it a natural opportunity to reevaluate and even improve the overall customer experience. The new system will also put the Bank among the list of major lenders that are running the latest banking software and drive growth and expansion. However, to further break down the move, The New Times, Edwin Ashimwe caught up with Desire Rumanyika, BK’s Chief Operating Officer, who discussed the expected results of the new system and addressed customer experience challenges after the migration. Excerpts, Bank of Kigali recently migrated to a new core banking system, could you tell us more about the expected improvements in the bank’s operations? The new core banking system is bringing a lot of value to our customers. Currently, we are open 24/7 for all customers using our channels, which was not the case in the past. In addition, we also expect to have better products because what the new core banking system is bringing is to set the foundation to allow room for better services for our customers. It is an exciting step for us at the Bank but it is also more customer oriented. After the migration, there were many complaints on transfers, push pull and bill payments. What is the current progress to stabilize these services? First of all, it is critical that we apologize as a service provider. We got some instabilities since the date of the migration but I am happy to report that our channels are stable now. Customers can transact and we are also refunding all the customers who lost money in the process. So far most of them have been refunded and we are working around the clock to refund those who have not yet been refunded. I also want to tell customers who still face issues with refunds, to reach out to us through our Contact Center (4455) or bk@bk.rw for a timely assistance. There are customers who were not able to access their accounts after the migration, are their funds safe? I can confirm that their funds are safe. Some of our customers were not able to access their accounts because of some restrictions that were migrated from the former core banking system to the new one. I want to reiterate that we are note sparing any efforts to remove such restrictions so that all our customers can access their funds. We call upon any customer who still faces the same issue to reach out to us for assistance. Will customers be able to access their transactions history especially for the period before the migration? Even though transactions’ history before October 15th 2021 were not migrated to the new core banking system, customers can reach out to us through our Contact Center available on 4455 and bk@bk.rw for support to get those accounts’ statements. BK account numbers changed after the migration, how can customers know their new account numbers? Accounts were changed after the migration to the new core banking system, but there is no need to worry because customers can still use the former account numbers to access their funds. However, every time customers get their account statements, the new account is displayed. Meanwhile, there have been complaints emerging from the long queues in the branches, is there any plan to address this issue? Absolutely. One of the reasons why we changed the core banking system is to allow the bank to build even more digital products. We aim to transition from a traditional bank to a digital bank that will allow customers to transact on the channels. I urge our customers to continue onboarding on the channels so that we have many customers transacting digitally. We also plan to employ personnel in different branches to raise awareness on our digital channels. We are optimistic that once we achieve the critical mass transacting on the channels, the pressure on our branches will reduce, also shortening the queues. Channels built on the system are stable and the call is to grasp the 24/7 opportunity. We reassure customers of a better experience and call them on to trust in the new banking system. The bank has invested heavily to get a new core banking system, which brings new products, new features, new security layers, that altogether bring more convenience particularly when customers are transacting.
