Many card issuers offer the budget facility as a vehicle for card holders to consolidate their existing debt and — in return — they offer customers an incentive in the pricing, in the form of preferential interest rates.
The rising popularity of debit cards complements the traditional credit card market.
Credit card initiatives and product innovations — many related to pricing — are about to be spawned in the marketplace as a direct result of the challenges the National Credit Act (NCA) originally posed to the banking fraternity.
The South African credit card industry is bracing itself for a new round of innovation and competition.
The provision in the National Credit Act to assist overindebted people to restructure their debt through debt counselling was not designed as a punitive measure — nor as a measure to enable debt-stressed people to borrow more money to pay off debt.
The commercial and wholesale banking arena differs from conventional retail banking, given the complexity and sophistication of business banking products and offerings in this highly specialised market segment. Oscar Grobler, of Absa Corporate Business Bank, says banks have struggled to define how they should segment their business banking offering.
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/ 19 September 2007
One in every 100 children suffers from congenital heart defects – and as many as 95% of these can be treated through surgery, enabling them to go on to live normal lives. But without treatment, these children die within weeks. Less than 30% of indigent South African children and 1% of children in the rest of the continent can afford the treatment they need.
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/ 19 September 2007
Lack of qualified human resources in the African healthcare arena continues to hinder poverty reduction and development, opening up further potential for computer-based learning models on the continent. A case in point is Kenya, where almost 90% of the country’s nurses are trained at the lowest “enrolled” status.
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/ 19 September 2007
The third annual Pan African Health (PAH) Congress, which takes place from September 18 to 19 at the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg, is billed as the premier platform for business-to-business networking in Africa’s healthcare industry. The key components of this year’s congress are a conference, a business-to business (B2B) networking forum and the second Absa Healthcare Initiative Awards.
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/ 19 September 2007
South Africa’s presidency presented a challenge to Stellenbosch University towards the end of 2000 — to develop a programme that addresses the HIV/Aids pandemic. So was born the postgraduate diploma in the management of HIV/Aids, which has now been accepted as a model for the African continent.