Vietnam - Did you say "Ethics"? - Dong A bank branch manager falls into trap of colleague?

The client who deposited money at Dong A Bank’s Tay Ninh branch, and then denounced the bank branch of breaking the ceiling interest rate regulations, is believed to be the director of another bank in the same province of Tay Ninh.

The monetary market is experiencing “scorching hot days” these days. The State Bank of Vietnam has threatened to punish the bankers who pay more than 14 percent per annum in interest rates for Vietnam dong deposits.

A director of Dong A Bank’s Tay Ninh branch, Nguyen Thai Hau, has been removed from his office. Meanwhile, Dong A Bank is not allowed to open more branches or set up more ATMs within one year since September 14.

Two branches of Agribank have also been found as offering additional money to depositors, thus making the actual deposit interest rates higher than 14 percent and have been punished.

Meanwhile, commercial banks have been in a state of anxious suspense because they fear that the capital will outflow from the banks when the deposit interest rates decrease to 14 percent. They also fear that an unhealthy competition would occur, when other banks break the regulations and offer high interest rates to scramble for depositors with them.

Therefore, people have every reason to think that a banker has lured the Director of the Dong A Bank’s Tay Ninh branch into a trap.

The incident occurred on September 8. On the morning of the day, Dong A Bank’s headquarter sent a dispatch to all the branches asking to stop the program on mobilizing capital at the interest rates higher than 14 percent per annum. However, later on the day, Director of the Tay Ninh Branch of Dong A Bank, Nguyen Thai Hau, still agreed to pay the interest rate of 15.5 percent per annum for a sum of deposit. The behavior of Hau was denounced by the depositor himself.

Hau later explained that the depositor was the director of another bank in the same province.

Director of the Tay Ninh branch of the State Bank of Vietnam, Nguyen Tien Phuc, said that he only received a report which said that a depositor denounced the Dong A’s branch of violating the ceiling interest rate regulations. Meanwhile, Phuc is not sure if the depositor is the director of another bank.

After making transactions at Dong A’s Tay Ninh branch, the depositor immediately sent the documents about the transactions directly to the State Bank of Vietnam, not to the Tay Ninh branch of the State Bank, to prove the violation of the Dong A’s branch. After that, the State Bank’s inspectors confirmed the violations after inspecting the bank branch.

“I was just reported to about the case before I decided to dismiss Hau. Therefore, I cannot say anything about if a banker denounced another of violating the laws,” Phuc said.

According to Vo Quang Vu, Lawyer of Tan A law firm said that if it happened that a banker tried to trap his counterpart, he does not violate the laws.

Meanwhile, Deputy General Director of a joint stock bank in HCM City, comments that in this case, the denouncer really “played dirty” on the colleague.

“It would be fair that someone discovers the violation and then reports the behavior to the management agencies. However, when you deliberately try to decoy another to your trap and then denounces the behavior, you play dirty on your colleague,” he said.

General Director of another joint stock bank also described the behavior as “unacceptable” and “blamable”. He commented that it is funny that banks once joined the interest rate race and raised the interest rates every day to scramble for depositors, and now they rush to denounce each other of breaking regulations.

Source: VnExpress/ VNN

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