DBS Bank woos small businesses with new credit solution; disbursed this much under pilot programme

Credit and Finance for MSMEs: Singapore-headquartered DBS Bank on Wednesday announced digital credit solutions called DBS Digital Business Loans for SMEs. The banks would offer credit up to Rs 5 crore for businesses up to Rs 25 crore turnover and up to Rs 20 crore for units having up to Rs 100 crore turnover. MSMEs can apply for loans on the bank’s website by just uploading bank statements and IT Returns (financial statements for loans above Rs 5 crore). “The data-driven platform then pulls in credit-related information at the backend and runs a financial health analysis on the overall business of the applicant. The platform is enabled to auto-generate an e-offer letter if the lending criteria is met,” the bank said in a statement.

Small businesses with up to Rs 25 crore turnover can get an in-principle approval for loans of up to Rs 5 crore within 24 hours subject to fulfilment of the lending criteria. Once verified, the loan can be sanctioned in five working days while disbursal can be made in a week. “We are attempting to leverage the true potential of our online credit platform, and have continued to disburse credit, even amidst the lockdown. DBS has also been offering the ‘Guaranteed Emergency Credit Line’ scheme in line with the government’s Covid-19 relief efforts,” said Niraj Mittal, Managing Director & Country Head – Institutional Banking Group, DBS Bank India.

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The bank would offer working capital financing, and trade facilities under both loan categories and would accept the residential, commercial and industrial property as collateral. The interest rate on loans would be based on “mutually agreed pricing” according to the bank.

The bank has already carried out a pilot project for the Digital Business Loans platform in New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai, Pune, Surat, Nashik, Kolhapur, and Kolkata. Importantly, it has already disbursed loans worth Rs 1,000 crore to units operating in trading, manufacturing and services. The service would be extended to SMEs in Gurugram, Noida, Navi Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Rajkot, Hyderabad, Coimbatore, Ludhiana, Jaipur, Nagpur, and Bhubaneswar.