Following their negotiations with banks, as many as 252 Romanians found a solution to their problems via ABDRC in the first nine months of the year versus 25 during the same period of last year.

The number of Romanian who approached ABDRC increased by 140% in the first nine months, compared to the same period of last year, up to 1,580. Of these, 862 consumers submitted compliant applications with ABDRC. This number is 3.2 times higher than in the same period of last year. This proves that the Alternative Banking Dispute Resolution Centre (ABDRC) has become an option that increasingly more Romanians pursue in their attempts to have their disagreements with financial institutions resolved.

 “After the first nine months, we managed to achieve some outstanding results: We went above the threshold of 400 casefiles created and 250 casefiles resolved, which shows a strong increase in the work of ABDRC and, implicitly, increasing awareness and interest from citizens in having their conflicts with banks settled amicably”, declared Alexandru Păunescu, member of the Steering Board of ABDRC.

In 90% of the cases, consumers and banks reconciled

Of the total number of casefiles resolved in the first nine months, 90% concluded with a resolution, meaning the solution proposed by the conciliator was accepted by both parties, and in only 10% by a report, meaning that at least one of the parties did not accept the proposed solution. The remaining created casefiles are in the screening phase. This shows that the credit institutions are increasingly more open, as they gradually understand the benefits of conciliation.

For instance, in June, one consumer from Dolj asked the bank to reduce both the monthly installment and the repayment period. He managed to have its entire debt of EUR 20,000 written off and the loan thus closed.

The online app of ABDRC, the method of choice for submitting casefiles

The third quarter was one of the best for ABDRC, with a 34% increase in the number of casefiles resolved supported by the launch in July of the online app whereby consumers can submit their requests to ABDRC in an easy, free and easily trackable manner. In the last week of September alone, we received as many as 30 compliant applications, of which 20 via the app.

This app reduces the document processing time from one day down to one hour

In fact, out of the total number of compliant applications received in months January – September (862), as many as 134 applications were filed via the app available on the Centre’s website. The app launched by ABDRC supports uploading all of all scanned documents directly on the institution’s websites, which reduces the processing time down to approximately one hours, compared to one day offline.

Unstressed crayons sweeten the relation with the bank

ABDRC’s message to consumers this year is that the relation with the bank can be sweetened. The campaign Save crayons from stress reached out to hundreds of thousands of users in the online environment. For those who are acquainted with our campaign or received unstressed crayons, the message is #Duvesteamaideparte (#passthenews).