Lending windows are opened to accompany school-going in the short and medium terms.
Barely one and a half month for students and pupils to resume classes for the 2013-2014 academic year, financial institutions in the country are already readjusting and revising their lending strategies to help parents and guardians for a hitch-free school resumption. Back-to-school loans are en vogue in banks now and parents and guardians, at least those who are gainfully employed, have a wide range of choices in the banks where their salaries are lodged to enhance a smooth preparation for school’s reopening.
While some financial institutions are carrying out wider publicity on the back-to-school loans they are offering and how desiring and deserving customers can access them, others are calm about it but all of them are maximising chances of giving out as many loans as possible. The process consists in offering special packages to parents and guardians with diverse characteristics. They are easy payments (10-month instalment), fast (24-48 hours) and fixed (at most a three-month salary of the customer).
At Cameroon Postal Services (CAMPOST) that recently embraced financial services to diversify its traditional role of receiving and despatching mails, the operation is full swing. Officials say the short-term university and school-fee loans offer opportunity to parents and guardians to surmount challenges inherent with schools reopening. They say to benefit from the flexible, available, minimal interest rate and easily refundable loans, beneficiaries are those whose monthly salaries or pensions are from FCFA 50,000 and above. They have the right to take a loan that must not go beyond their three-month salary, payable in ten months at a 1.4 per cent monthly interest rate. Besides a minimum monthly salary of FCFA 50,000, aspirants must have at least a three-month salary account at CAMPOST and must not be older than 69 years. Application files comprise a hand-written application, attestation of irrevocable crediting of salary, photocopy of national identity card, loan and insurance conventions, printed copy of school fee loan application as well as payslips for the past three months.
Meanwhile at Ecobank, visitors do not need to be told of the availability of the loan. “Cresco 2013. Get school-fee loan in 24 hours,” is what greets visitors at the reception of the bank. But only salary earners at the bank have the opportunity to bag home the loans. They need a hand-written application, last two payslips, attestation of irrevocable crediting of salary and an attestation of effective presence to have the cash. The same holds for BICEC whose billboards reading, “BICEC school fee loans are back again. University and school fee loans available now in all our branches,” are eye-catching. All attempts to get information on the rate of interest, duration and others failed as officials opted for tight lips. But many customers Cameroon Tribune met in the banks last Friday saluted the initiative which they say helps them for a hitch-free back to school and the banks too as they are also making quick interest.
