Capitalizing on the huge payroll-based depositors in the country, Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) introduced a unique way of encouraging savings among the wage-earners Filipinos, through its “BPI Direct Save-Up” service.
This new bank service provides an automatic transfer to a separate account, from a payroll account, to promote savings among Filipinos, who have been known as “poor savers.”
In an interview with BPI senior vice president and chief marketing officer Jojo Ocampo, she said that this service is expected to heighten Filipinos’ saving lifestyle, to give them security for future needs.
Aside from giving a high-interest yield, this service also comes with a full life insurance of the account holder, which is 10 times the amount of the current balance.
According to Ocampo, this product is seen to improve the rate of Filipino wage earners to save, and automatically take a portion of their monthly income for their future needs.
“Usually, when pay day comes, most spend all their salary, and left nothing for savings, this product will automatically get a portion of a month’s salary to a special Direct Save-Up account,” Ocampo said.
She said encouraging the culture for savings must be promoted very well, especially for the young-professionals, or the new generation workers.
“Every time we get our pay, we always get a portion for ourselves—to treat ourselves for the month’s hard work. There is nothing wrong with that, but what is important is one should understand the need to save and it should be part of the monthly budget,” she said.
She said financial literacy should be promoted well these days, especially to the young generation monthly-earners, so that one should not be hooked on debt after debt cycle, or “rat race.”
Philippines is one of the countries in the world, where savings rate is very low, BPI hopes that through this facility, savings culture in the Philippines will be improved, together with heightened promotion of financial literacy among monthly earners.
This particular special bank account does not need an initial deposit. The account holder will only express his/her intent to open a Direct-Save-Up account, and specify the amount each payday to be transferred to this separate account.
BPI is the largest bank network in the country with a total of 827 branches nationwide.
In Cebu, there are 37 BPI branches, including mini-banks, kiosks, and mall-base branches. — Ehda M. Dagooc