BCR closes down the inactive current accounts

Bucharest, December 10th, 2009 - Banca Comerciala Romana (BCR) will conduct, between December 12th - 13th, 2009, a database quality streamlining process consisting of closing down the inactive current accounts of individuals. This process will improve the efficiency of banking operations performed by customers.

The streamlining process consists of closing down those current accounts that have not been used by individual customers for the past 6 consecutive calendar months for banking operations and that are empty. The operation is carried out in agreement with the provisions stipulated in the contracts signed with customers.

Customers whose inactive current accounts will be closed down will not incur any cost for this operation.

"The process of closing down the inactive current accounts will significantly improve the quality of the services we offer, thus making it more time-efficient for BCR customers to conduct banking operations. Carrying out this process is the natural and obvious step to take following the development of the IT system. If, in the past, BCR customers were able to conduct banking operations only in the unit where they opened their current account, after developing the IT system, BCR customers have free and unrestricted access to their account from any unit of the bank or through alternative channels, other than the bank tellers, therefore they no longer use all the current accounts they opened in the past and some of them have now become inactive current accounts", stated Sorin Mititelu, the Executive Director of BCR's Business and Retail Products Development Department.

The current accounts that customers use in relation with other BCR products they have will not be closed down (for instance: accounts with debit cards attached to them, current accounts attached to savings or lending products of any kind). These current accounts will continue to be active as before in order to provide customers full access to the BCR products in connection to which they were opened.

Deposit accounts, savings accounts, accounts for certificates of deposit, credit accounts - of any type, card accounts - of any type will not be closed down either. They will continue to be active as before, in agreement with the provisions from the contracts signed with BCR customers using these products.

The closing down process is intended solely for current accounts. BCR, a member of the Erste Group, is a universal bank dedicated to both retail and corporate customers. BCR is the leading banking organization in Romania, managing assets worth of more than EUR 17.2 billion. BCR is the most valuable Romanian financial services brand. The bank is offering a full range of banking services having 659 retail branches and agencies (for individuals and micro corporations) located in most of the Romanian cities with a population of more than 10,000 inhabitants. The corporate customers are serviced in 50 corporate commercial centres dedicated exclusively to SMEs and big companies. The bank provides to both retail and corporate customers a complex offer of banking products and services, including Internet banking, phone banking and e-commerce services. BCR issues 25 types of debit and credit card, and is the owner of the largest national ATM and POS network - over 2,000 machines and over 17.000 electronic terminals operational at the merchants, for card payments. BCR is currently the most important financial Group in Romania, with operations both in Romania and abroad developed by its local branches, foreign banking subsidiaries and representative offices. BCR is also holding top positions on the financial market segments for leasing, asset management, housing bank, equity and pension funds supported by its domestic subsidiaries.

Erste Group is one of the leading financial providers in CEE. More than 51.000 employees serve 17 million clients in 3,000 branches in 8 countries (Austria, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Ukraine). As of 30 September 2009 Erste Group has reached EUR 203.6 billion in total assets, a net profit of EUR 720.1 million and cost-income-ratio of 50.9%.

For more information about the products and services provided by BCR:
· Call 0801.0801.227 (InfoBCR) on the fixed phone network, for a local tariff regardless of the country region where the call is placed; call 021/407.42.00 from any phone network or *0801227 using the Vodafone EasyDial service, Mondays through Sundays, between 8:00 and 22:00
· Send an e-mail message at contact.center@bcr.ro. Your enquiries are processed on a daily basis, and the available information in the Contact Center will be provided within a maximum of 24 hours from the receipt of your message.
· Call 021/311.10.01 and 021/311.02.16 for card assistance services, 24 h 7 days.

For more information:
BCR, Communications Division
Phone 312.00.56; Fax 313 0117
Corneliu Cojocaru, e-mail: cornel.cojocaru@bcr.ro
Cezar Marin, e-mail: cezar.marin@bcr.ro
Nicoleta Deliu, e-mail: nicoleta.deliu@bcr.ro