Reference no: EM132819265

In June 2020, Scotiabank (formerly known as The Bank of Nova Scotia), the Canadian multinational banking and financial services company with assets of over $1.2 trillion and approximately 97,000 employees, received the Retail Banking Security Innovation of the Year Award from Retail Banker International (RBI). This award was in recognition of Scotiabank's use of digital technologies to create financial crimes risk management program. Over the years, Scotiabank had been at the forefront of using digital technologies like Smart Automation in its banking operations and customer service. That helped the bank to improve its customer service and control online frauds. As the COVID-19 pandemic swept through the world, the biggest challenge for banks like Scotiabank was to provide continuous support to customers and employees to ensure uninterrupted banking. With the help of Smart Automation, Scotiabank continued to offer its products and services such as mortgage, direct deposits, and loans online. A note on Scotiabank, on March 30, 1832, the Legislative Assembly of Nova Scotia formed the first public financial institution in the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, under the name The Bank of Nova Scotia. William Lawson became the first president of the bank. In August 1832, the bank was officially opened and it focused on establishing a foreign exchange business with agents in New York, London, and Boston, while local agencies and the main office at Halifax concentrated on offering loans. From 1832 to 1881, the bank grew slowly and faced increasing competition from existing institutions like Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC), and Royal Bank of Canada (RBC). Since 2015, Scotiabank had spent $10.7 billion on technology. At the end of 2015, it partnered with fintech start-ups to embrace digital banking. In 2017, it launched Scotiabank Digital Factory, a digital production facility, to improve customers' experience in several areas such as mobile and digital banking transactions, account openings, loan adjudication, and mortgage lending. In October 2018, Scotiabank partnered with CGI Inc. to promote Intelligence Automation. This helped the bank achieve digital transformation by empowering trade finance operations and compliance and relationship management with the digitization of paper document flows. Scotiabank's huge technology spend over the previous five years had left it prepared to deal with any crisis situation such as the COVID-19 pandemic. The bank took several measures to support both employees and customers during the crisis. It joined hands with government to provide support to Canadian businesses impacted by the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, introduced the Payment Deferral Process, Direct Deposit of Cheques, Faster Mortgage Deferral Process, Business Continuity Plan, Employee and client communications, and Digital Banking for seniors. Along with its precautionary measures, Scotiabank improved its digital banking offerings by introducing new efficient Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), Intelligent Deposit Machines that allowed customers immediate access to their deposits, introduction of new transaction and security alerts, and the addition of credit card controls. That resulted in growth of its online and mobile banking offerings. By the end of May 2020, the International Banking segment of Scotiabank had processed over 2 million CAP applications on loans totaling US$ 20 billion. Its digital capabilities in the Pacific Alliance resulted in approximately 80% of CAP applications being enrolled via digital Omni channel tools. To support small businesses and corporate clients, the bank provided additional loans of over US$ 45 billion. Its digital banking solutions were adopted by more than 140,000 customers. That resulted in an increase in digital transactions by 50% compared to the previous year. The bank saw strong growth in its digital subsidiary Tangerine and online discount brokerage iTrade.

Explain the strategies adopted by banks to combat COVID-19. The explanation should be based on one selected bank in Malaysia.