Excellence in leadership in Latin America 2020: Banreservas

Banreservas responded to the national state of emergency brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic by working closely with the Dominican Republic’s authorities and the central bank to keep the banking system liquid and avoid corporate insolvencies.

However, it is the bank’s work in finding a rapid solution to provide financial support to 700,000 families in extreme poverty that stands out. The Social Security Administration (ADESS) needed to create a new payments system to reach these most vulnerable citizens – and Banreservas managed to put together a solution within two weeks.

Chief executive Simón Lizardo Mezquita pulled together a working group that proposed a new national payments system that could be integrated into the existing payments ecosystem and, crucially, didn’t require physical intervention, which was critical to avoid the spread of the virus.

It also didn’t depend on the use of a mobile telephone device, since it was unclear if many of its intended beneficiaries had access to them.

The new system enabled the country’s national identity card to be used as a virtual credit card.