RCBC beefs up credit card operations

RIZAL Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC) is beefing up its credit card operations as part of the company’s thrust to focus more on the profitable retail market.

This year, RCBC plans to add 100,000 new cardholders to its client base, representing a growth of 25 percent over the level seen at the end of 2014. This is the first major expansion in the bank’s credit card user base in recent years. To reach this goal, the bank of the Yuchengco group launched several new features that would make credit cards friendlier for new users.

“Credit cards should be a tool for financial management,” said Angela Mirasol, vice president and marketing head for RCBC Bankard Services Corp., the RCBC group’s credit card subsidiary.

At the end of last year, the bank had about 500,000 credit card accounts, making it the sixth-largest issuer of plastic money in the country, based on industry statistics. Mirasol said RCBC’s management had already earmarked capital that would allow the group’s credit card business to grow by a quarter in 2015.

She said RCBC would issue more cards to employees and other personnel of companies in the Yuchengco Group of Companies.

“If you want to be more conscientious with spending, you have to consolidate,” Mirasol said. “We want to be the preferred card,” Mirasol said.