{"id":15030,"date":"2020-06-16T13:42:41","date_gmt":"2020-06-16T13:42:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/?p=15030"},"modified":"2020-06-16T13:42:41","modified_gmt":"2020-06-16T13:42:41","slug":"how-financial-institutions-are-supporting-smes-in-the-cis-and-the-caucasus-with-non-financial-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/how-financial-institutions-are-supporting-smes-in-the-cis-and-the-caucasus-with-non-financial-services\/","title":{"rendered":"How financial institutions are supporting SMEs in the CIS and the Caucasus with non-financial services"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There has been a large focus on how financial institutions are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic; however, much of that focus has been of the financial services they are offering small- and medium-enterprises (SMEs) to help them get through the pandemic. Our friends at SME Banking Club decided to ask financial institutions operating in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and the Caucasus what non-financial services they\u2019ve started offering SMEs. Here are some of the highlights:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Alfa Bank Belarus has placed its large library of educational business video content in the public domain via a new YouTube channel (Alfa-Hub).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Alfa Bank Kazakhstan regularly publishes and sends news to consumers, including on how to conduct banking operations remotely, how to take advantage of COVID-19-related measures designed to support consumers and SMEs and the impact of COVID-19 around the world. They also have a separate line in its contact center and WhatsApp chat for legal entities and entrepreneurs.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ATFBank (Kazakhstan) is in communication with a third-party company related to developing a series of webinars on topics such as <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">How to Manage a Business Remotely<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Business Transformation in Connection with the Quarantine<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bank Vostochny (Russia) launched a hotline for entrepreneurs in connection with COVID-19 in March. One of the bank&#8217;s top managers is also available every weekday for two hours to answer SMEs questions online.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">VTB Bank (Russia) is creating online courses for managers on creative thinking in business, negotiations, financial and managerial accounting and digital innovations.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bank of Georgia helps SMEs digitize their businesses via a partner organization that helps businesses launch sales on search engine-optimized and well-advertised online marketplaces. The bank has also been actively involved in the training of entrepreneurs, offering one webinar or training event every week.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kapital Bank (Azerbaijan) is raising money for the COVID-19 Fund through its mobile app as well as publishing updated information about COVID-19 and how to protect against it.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Modulbank (Russia) has launched a series of free personal consultations for entrepreneurs who have suffered from the impact of COVID-19.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">MTBank Belarus is considering the possibility of hosting online meetings to help businesses cooperate while reducing their costs and achieving maximum efficiency in their work in the current economic conditions.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">PrivatBank (Ukraine) offers training programs and conferences on its online platform.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">FUIB (Ukraine) communications are mainly aimed at informing consumers about COVID-19 related matters, including the precautionary measures taken to combat its spread.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Raiffeisen Bank Aval (Ukraine) is offering all its business customers 6 free months of Microsoft business services.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"rpbt_shortcode\">\n\n<div id='rpbt-related-gallery-1' class='gallery related-gallery related-galleryid-15030 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item' role='group' aria-label='Uberization turning the banking business model upside down'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/uberization-turning-the-banking-business-model-upside-down\/'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/turning-banking-business-model-upside-down-150x150.png\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"rpbt-related-gallery-1-10556\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='rpbt-related-gallery-1-10556'>\n\t\t\t\tUberization turning the banking business model upside down\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item' role='group' aria-label='The rise of BigTechs in finance highlights important issues'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/the-rise-of-bigtechs-in-finance-highlights-important-issues\/'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/the-rise-of-bigtechs-in-finance-highlights-important-issues-150x150.png\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"rpbt-related-gallery-1-13518\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='rpbt-related-gallery-1-13518'>\n\t\t\t\tThe rise of BigTechs in finance highlights important issues\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item' role='group' aria-label='Coming soon: 3 big changes for B2B payments'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/coming-soon-3-big-changes-for-b2b-payments\/'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/583b3296-4465-450d-bc90-453a12393ebe-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"rpbt-related-gallery-1-14915\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='rpbt-related-gallery-1-14915'>\n\t\t\t\tComing soon: 3 big changes for B2B payments\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There has been a large focus on how financial institutions are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic; however, much of that focus has been of the financial services they are offering small- and medium-enterprises (SMEs) to help them get through the pandemic. Our friends at SME Banking Club decided to ask financial institutions operating in the &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":15031,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,338,10,14,76,12,201],"tags":[543,141,533],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15030"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15030"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15030\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15032,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15030\/revisions\/15032"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bulletins.bfconsulting.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}