KTB eyes its cardholders with bundled products
Krungthai Bank hopes to attract more banking customers by offering bundled products through its subsidiaries.
KTB has started by offering a three-month fixed-deposit product via Krungthai Card (KTC), its credit-card subsidiary. Deposits attract an interest rate of 6.25-6.5 per cent per annum for KTC cardholders redeeming points under the "Forever Smile" programme.
Cardholders will have to redeem 1,000 KTC Forever Rewards points to get the right to open the account.
KTC customers who prefer to open these accounts through KTB netbank will get a rate of 6.5 per cent, while 6.25 per cent will be offered to customers who opt to do so at bank branches.
Chainarong Eursithichai, senior vice president of KTB’s Retail Business and Network Group, yesterday said Forever Smile is a pilot project for the bank and KTC, with KTB using it to expand its customer base by attracting clients of the bank’s subsidiaries, while KTC will use it to drive the user-reward points system.
"We found that most KTC cardholders have never been our customers, so we want to promote our products and services to them in order to offer cross-selling products in the future. The deposit product with a high rate is expected to encourage cardholders to redeem more of their points," he said.
KTB aims to draw at least Bt2.5 billion in deposits from KTC cardholders via the first bundled product. The programme expires at the end of February.
The bank plans to apply the bundled-product principle to subsidiaries such as KTB Leasing in the next phase, which could take place next year, Chainarong said.
Piyasak Tejasen, KTC senior executive vice president, said KTC and KTB had joined forces to offer value for those cardholders who do not want to redeem points for goods or services. Some cardholders have said that they want their points also to be convertible for investment purposes.
While KTC has 1.6 million credit cards providing 13 billion reward points, customers do not make anything like as much use of the reward scheme as they could, he said.
Cardholders earn one reward point for every Bt25 they spend. Each cardholder has about 7,000-8,000 points on average.
Piyasak added that the new programme would enhance spending and attract general customers to apply for KTC cards in order to get the chance to open a deposit account, because the interest rate of 6.5 per cent is the highest currently available for three-month fixed deposits across the banking industry.
