High Court of Justice in the long lasting dispute with the Court of Accounts regarding the building society (bauspar) system. As BCR BpL considers that both before and after the enactment of the revised Bauspar legislation it has duly observed the legal provisions, that were grounded on European best practices, it will further represent client and its own rights, as soon as the High Court’s motivation is published. The legal action considered by the bank include legal actions in Romania, as well as in international courts.
The matter of the dispute regards a 2015 control report of the Court of Accounts, which challenged the manner clients of the building society system benefitted from the state premium. The main issues raised were related to the justification of receiving the state premium by the clients (clearly regulated by the law and in line with EU building society legislation) and the fact that underage and senior people were allegedly not eligible for state premium (also clearly permitted by the law and in line with EU building society legislation). Thus, BCR BpL challenged the Court of Account’s findings and the Court of Appeal ruled in first instance overwhelmingly in favor of the bank.
The matter remains equally critical in terms of judgement predictability, as BpL has always acted in accordance with building society legislation and transferred best business practice from leading EU role models of Germany and Austria, which have succesfully used building society system to improve housing conditions for over 70 years.
Moreover, as the Romanian Parliament conducted a review of the Bauspar law, the outcome of this process proved to be consistent with BpL’s approach towards the law and its clients. During all this period, as the state premium was suspended, the Bank acted in good faith and covered from own sources the equivalent of the state premium for over 100,000 clients.
Not only has the bank considered itself as duly observing all legal provisions, but it also considered the clients are unjustly impacted by the decision of the Court of Accounts. To this end, the potential effect of the ruling in its current format will impair the continuation of the building society market and will most probably lead to the demise of such system in Romania. Notwithstanding this, BCR Group will continue to optimally service its clients, considering BCR Group capital and liquidity positions remain strong with a considerable margin above regulatory requirements, despite a conservative impact estimate.
BCR Banca pentru Locuințe (BCR BpL) represents the interests of more than 300,000 clients. Currently BCR BpL registers total assets of RON 2.67 billion as of 31.03.2019.
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Banca Comerciala Romana (BCR), a member of Erste Group, is the most important financial group in Romania, including operations of universal bank (retail, corporate & investment banking, treasury and capital markets), as well as specialized companies on the leasing market, private pensions, housing banks and banking services. BCR is No. 1 bank in Romania on the assets value (over EUR 14.8 billion), No. 1 Bank by number of clients and No. 1 bank by savings and financing segments. BCR is the most valuable financial brand from Romania, considering the degree of trust of the clients and the number of people for whom BCR is the main banking institution.
BCR offers a complete range of products and financial services through a network of 22 business centres and 18 mobile offices for companies and 513 retail units located in major cities across the country with over 10,000 inhabitants. BCR is the No. 1 bank in Romania on the bank transaction market, BCR clients having available the largest national network of ATMs – over 2,000 ATMs and POSs – over 15,200 card payment terminals to merchants, as well as full service Internet banking, Mobile Banking, Phone-banking and E-commerce.
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Erste Group is one of the main financial service providers from the Eastern European Union. 46,700 employees serve 15.9 million clients in 2,700 branches from 7 countries (Austria, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia). At the end of the third trimester of 2016, Erste Group had total assets in amount of EUR 206.8 billion, a net profit of EUR 1.18 billion, and also 1st rank common capital index (Basel 3 fully integrated) of 13.2%.
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BCR – External Communication
Catalin Ionita, e-mail: georgecatalin.ionita@bcr.ro
This information is also available on our web page at: www.bcr.ro
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