Economy Desk: The government has included various conditions in giving ‘incentive bonuses’ to state-owned commercial and specialized bank employees. As a result, now the board of directors of government banks cannot give more than three bonuses, even if they want to. Recently, the Financial Institutions and Market Division of the Ministry of Finance published guidelines called ‘Utsah Bonus’.
It said that ‘incentive bonus’ is not a right; it is a financial benefit given at the special discretion of the board. Paying this bonus directly puts pressure on cash and reduces it. Draft guidelines were issued in 2014 to provide financial facilities to state-owned commercial banks. The recommendation was to give bonuses on the basis of the net profit rate of the working fund, but in the current context, the state-owned bank Bangladesh Bank is showing the latter with the benefit of saving provisions. As a result, actually adjusting the provision deficit of the banks would result in a loss instead of a net profit, said the Ministry of Finance.
According to the ministry, state banks provide low-interest loans to various government sectors, provide various government services free of charge, and provide various services related to the social safety net. As a result, they cannot earn the desired profit. In such a situation, guidelines have been given regarding incentive bonuses with the objective of requiring the voluntary participation of overall growth and development officers of the banks.
The new guidelines set a score of 20 percent on the annual performance agreement (APA) implementation rate of banks and 80 percent on the operating profit rate. Based on this score, the incentive bonus will be distributed from the operating profit. As a result, from now on, no bank will be able to give a bonus if the score is below 50. And if you get a score of 50 to 60, you will get an incentive bonus equal to one month’s basic salary; if you score 61 to 70, you will get one and a half months; if you score 71 to 80, you will get two months; if you score 81 to 90, you will get two and a half months; and if you score more than 90, you will get a festive bonus equal to three months’ basic salary. Government bankers.
Officials of the state-owned banks said that considering the net profit so far, the board of the respective banks decided how much the incentive bonus would be. Employees of banks and financial institutions used to get three to four bonuses in a year. As a result of the new guidelines, government banks will not be able to give more than three bonuses. A number of conditions have been laid down for the implementation of these guidelines and the determination of scores. If anyone wants to give an incentive bonus outside of these guidelines, then the approval of the Financial Institutions Department is required. The guidelines ask to calculate the operating profit by deducting the total operating expenses from the total operating income of the bank.
