Message From General Manager

Dear Customers and Colleagues

As a result of rapid changes and developments in countries both near and far, we are also affected by these changes in worldwide economies and societies. Previously financial information only attracted the attention of economists and bankers but now both individuals and companies are starting to realize the relevance and pay more attention to the changes. Dependent on the financial awareness and literacy level, individuals and companies alike, should consider the information available in conjunction with their future expectations when making financial decisions plus analyse the decisions that have already been taken.

Within İktisatbank both our branch and head office sales teams continuously demonstrate their maximum effort to improve themselves with the aim of increasing financial literacy and awareness of our individual and commercial customers and their needs in the complex world of finances.

Our teams are continuously out in the market place to identify the needs of our customers during this period of hard cyclical fluctuations. They continue to focus on the needs of our customers by visiting and asking them relevant questions to identify their needs to enable them to offer optimal financing models and other financial products in a timely manner.

At İktisatbank, our customers are always the focal point of our activities. In accordance with our understanding of customer-oriented ‘financial supermarket’ we try our best to collate all our resources and the newest banking products under one umbrella to enable us to offer them to our customers. We are always nearby wherever you are in Cyprus to support and help you with our 250 colleagues and 16 branches where you can make transactions easily.

At İktisatbank, we are working to contribute towards a stable and sustainable development for our country through economic growth; we are contributing economic power to North Cyprus with both short, mid and long term maturities by providing finance and productive tools to businesses and the industry within which they work.

The reality of the main difficulty of SME is the lack of capital and access to financial resources; we support their operations in accordance with their needs, with innovative and advantageous programs.
During the loan application process, we continue to give prominence to our existing framework, credit facility strategies and we focus more than ever on appropriate project-oriented works within the needs of our economies.

We continue to provide support to producers, industry workers and tourism sector along with the TRNC Ministry of Economy and Energy and Ministry of Finance. We are one of the few banks that provide interest-backed financing packages for investors in dormitory projects to give the best quality accommodation to students who come to live here whilst studying. We have financed the needs of the sectors with sectoral loans for the future of our country by giving micro loans with no interest for housewives whom are making products within their home and contributing to their own economy.

Letters of credit, foreign letters of guarantee, acceptance loans, and cash loans against document collateral and suchlike, making it possible for our customers to carry out foreign trade transactions in every region of the world possible; we also provide financial support to our customers.
We have experienced the biggest change in the consumer banking area/sector together with the slogan ‘’New Smart, New life’’ and the introduction of our new look SmartCard. We have added new features to the existing SmartCard features such as; with every transaction worldwide you now get more points all, take advantage of Ercan Bosphore CIP lounge, Smart Assistance, Smart Travel, Installments, Installment Shift, %50 discount on movie tickets. We have continued to spoil over 20.000 Smart customers. Our team is continuing at full speed to develop many other innovations and campaigns.

We continue to offer numerous solutions for both financing and investments in line with the needs of our retail customers by our team. We are always supporting our customer with every step they take to increase their financial literacy and to raising awareness.
We strive to diversify our products and services offered in the banking sector. Almost all operational processes were taken away from our branch staff to ensure they are more attentive to our customers’ needs and wants; we have created operation team within our Headquarter which is a first experience in Cyprus. This team continue to offer an impeccable, fast and quality service to both internal and external customers. In order to provide services in a comfortable environment, we have also renovated our branches.

Technology is in the genes of İktisatbank, it is in its DNA. We have changed the way we operate completely, to accommodate the ever changing lifestyles of our customers with products and services in digital and mobile technology making it easier than ever before for our customers to work with us. With an aim of becoming a bank that follows the latest trends of the digital era we have implemented many innovative solutions. At Iktisatbank the vision of the digital age is not to follow the trend but to develop and create it. Up until today we have applied many innovative aspects to make both our operations easier and providing a better life for our customers.

Our ADC (Alternative Distribution Channels) team is responsible for the digital platform developments including the installation of new ATM’s that race with our branches in relation to the transactions that can be done including salary payments, transfers, foreign exchange, cash withdrawal, depositing funds plus many more functions. It is with great pleasure that I share with you the fact that 98% of our ATM’s have been providing uninterrupted service over the last two years.

Our Internet Branch is only a click away with EFT, EPS, all foreign exchange transactions, managing demand and deposit accounts, making swift transfers to any point in the world on the same day, buying and selling gold, silver, platinum plus many other transactions you may wish to do.
Our Telephone Banking +90(392)444-4444 is providing service everyday from 08:00 to 20:00 by giving Turkish, English and Russian information, updates and assistance with financial transactions.

In nearest future the biggest innovation that we will face is the launch of our Smart Mobile Banking application created using real mobile technology.

Over the past year our Treasury Team was always there for all of our clients to provide the best solutions in order to manage the fluctuations. They were pushing the boundaries to establish competitive currency pricing with an annual foreign transaction sign off in the region of two billion dollars. Our Super Account allows you to carry out currency exchange transactions before the maturity and without losing any interest. In addition you have the Interim Payment Account providing interest payments at set interims throughout the year, plus a number of other investment products suitable to the needs of our customers.

Our Treasury team has also been the first in North Cyprus to open precious metals gold and silver accounts adding these to our shopping trolley of products, plus you can earn interest on gold deposit accounts.

In addition to TL and foreign currency bonds in both the public and private sector, fixed and changing investment returns we are the first bank in Northern Cyprus to introduce the collective payment system. We have now extended our TL and Foreign currency transfer times for both our individual and corporate customers.

We are creating solutions for individuals and enterprises against financial risks with SWAP, forward and option products.

Our IT (Information Technology) team has worked with all the power they have to provide uninterrupted service to our bank with the installation of hardware infrastructure to all information systems, providing cyber security. Information Technology has been and will continue to be improved to keep up with the ever changing technological world.

Our Human Resources team carries out the employment procedures in a precise manner to ensure the support of our employees and also to assist the young generation to get into the working life. They also help our existing/sustainable human resources by creating an environment to further develop themselves with both in house and external training. All employees undergo a 360 degree performance review on a regular basis; this is another first in our country.

Nearly 28 years before on 2 November 1990, we started on a journey with 37 Entrepreneurs who invested 5.291 in capital, a small team with big ideas. We are all happy because, today we have 185m TL in equity, 2.1 mia TL active asset size, 1.9 mia TL deposit, 1.4m TL credit, almost 100 thousand customers, 250 employees some of whom speak a number of foreign language like their native language, 16 branches and the technological infrastructure to continue to grow.

I can proudly state that, this picture is created with our stable growth policy, our competent team of employees, our commercial success as well as our social stakeholders. It’s been 28 years that our missions are shaping our activities with customers’ lives, within the sector and the bright future of our country. We are living with the pride of heading towards our goals with sustainable business models, the work that we do is renowned within the sector as best practices. Over the 28 years we have 80,000 customers which mean that at least 1 person in every family is an İktisatbank customer, this is a great market share.

28 years is an extremely short period of time for our sector. We have accomplishes great results things during this period of time.

In summary, we have been investing for 28 years in your happiness. Because for us to progress means we must pave the way of your dreams. Because for us the leadership, is to make you the boss of your own business. Because for us getting bigger is putting a bigger smile on your face.

As the 5th general manager of İktisatbank I want to thank all of our colleagues and our customers that make us feel proud of our success, with the power of being a family and trust, I would like to say ‘’full speed ahead’’ working for Cyprus and a pioneer of firsts.

Olgun ÖNAL
General Manager