Maybank: Islamic banking website income to rise

MALAYAN Banking Bhd (Maybank) may earn up to 30 per cent more from its Islamic banking website, Maybank2e.net, this year as more corporate customers use the service, a top official said.

Executive director and chief financial officer Datuk Aminuddin Md Desa said the portal has already chalked up RM60 million in fee-based income from July to April this year.

Total fee income to be earned from the portal in fiscal 2008, which ends on June 30, should be 25 to 30 per cent more than last year, he said.

This is in tandem with a strong growth in the number of customers using the Islamic banking web site for services like payroll, Employees Provident Fund payment, SOCSO services and various types of transactions within Maybank or between local banks.

Maybank2e.net currently has 8,500 corporate customers.

Online zakat payment will be the next service added to the portal after the bank tied-up with three zakat bodies from the Federal Territory, Selangor and Negri Sembilan yesterday to allow companies and their staff to contribute zakat online through the Maybank website.

Aminuddin said the online payment will benefit both the zakat agencies and the contributing companies as it is convenient.

"Maybank2e.net will automate the zakat payment and resolve many issues related to handling cash, such as security. We expect some 120 companies to use the service during the next 12 months," he said in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.

Zakat payments rose sevenfold from RM61 million in 1991 to RM473 million in 2004, the larger portion of which were collected by the three state agencies that tied-up with Maybank.

Maybank2e.net was set up in the 1990s as the country's first Islamic Internet-based cash management portal.