Commonwealth Bank of Australia Outlines Support for Customers and Businesses Impacted by COVID-19

“The Commonwealth Bank recognises the uncertainty as the nation responds to the challenges posed by the coronavirus,” Mr Comyn said. “Australia has a strong and stable financial system and economy, and we recognise the important role we play to support our customers, our people, our suppliers and the economy. We are assessing the impact on our operations on a daily basis.

“Our first priority remains at all times the safety and wellbeing of our customers and people. We are taking practical precautions in line with the latest guidance from Federal and State authorities.”

Retail customers

During this period we are offering our customers various options to continue to do their banking:

• Our network of more than 900 branches is open for business, and we have implemented measures to protect the safety of our people and customers.
• Customers can access their accounts 24 hours a day through NetBank or the CommBank App, where they can do most of their everyday banking.  We will continue to provide updates to our customers including through the CommBank App.
• Our people are available to help our customers who are unfamiliar with digital banking.
• We continue to process home loan applications quickly and efficiently. We have announced we will reduce our home loan rates by 25 basis points.

We encourage our retail customers who may be facing hardship due to impacts of the virus to contact us so that we can provide them with assistance for example hardship options including deferral of loan repayments. Customers can contact our Financial Assistance team for help.

Small and medium business customers

Recognising the important role small and medium businesses play across the economy, we are:

• Reducing rates on business loans by 25 basis points.
• Providing additional resourcing and extended hours for commercial lending teams to ensure faster decision times for small business loans.
• Providing a range of support measures to our impacted business customers by deferring repayments and waiving fees.

We will continue to contact our small and medium business customers who may be facing financial difficulty to ensure they are aware of the assistance we can provide, including:

• Deferring repayments on a variety of business loan and overdraft products, for 90 days.
• Waiving merchant terminal fees for impacted customers with CBA payment terminals, for 90 days.
• Waiving early redraw fees on business term deposit accounts (including Farm Management Deposit accounts).
• Waiving establishment fees and excess interest on Temporary Excess products.
• Deferring repayments on vehicle and equipment finance loans, and providing tailored restructuring options that meet individual customer needs.

Business customers can contact their relationship manager or our dedicated Business Financial Assistance team on 13 26 07.

Paying Australian suppliers faster

As a major purchaser of goods and services, we are also committed to supporting our business partners through these times.

CBA will work to prioritise payments to our small and medium business suppliers, and look at ways to offer flexibility to those whose activities have suffered disruption due to recent events.  Currently two thirds of our suppliers are on immediate payment terms, and we will continue to move more of our existing suppliers to immediate payment terms where practical.

Mr Comyn said, “Commonwealth Bank’s strong financial position means Australians can have confidence in our ability to support the economy in this period of difficulty, through to a time of recovery.”