RIYADH, 29 May 2005 — The Saudi British Bank (SABB) and Hafil Transport Establishment recently signed an “ijara” (rental) lease contract for the lease of 5,500 buses for SR848 million to transport Haj pilgrims.
The project is the first of its kind in the Kingdom on the basis of the Islamic ijara concept for leasing Haj and Umrah buses.
The agreement was signed at the offices of Hafil Est. in the presence of Yousef Naghi, Geoff Calvert, managing director of SABB, and Waleed A. Kayyal, SABB’s Western region general manager for financial services.
Commenting on the event, Calvert said: “The SABB takes the opportunity to highlight the efforts of the Ministry of Haj for providing the best services to the pilgrims which continue to develop every season. We wish to take part in the success of these efforts.
“SABB is proud to be the first bank in the Kingdom to provide this service to corporate customers in the field of pilgrims and visitors’ transport. This will be added to our achievements, which evidence SABB’s capabilities in the Saudi banking sector and success in the management of the projects in which we take part,” Calvert added.
SABB also signed some time back an agreement with Sejel Technology Co. to electronically handle the payments of Umrah visa fees on a global basis. This was done within the framework of the efforts of the Ministry of Haj to facilitate Umrah procedures and enable pilgrims to electronically apply and pay for their Umrah packages through the authorized agents outside the Kingdom.
SABB is considered one of the local banks most committed to supporting projects and activities in social, economical and development fields. It has to its credit a string of achievements in the recent past such as the “Best Bank in the Kingdom for 2004” award from Euromoney International for the second year in a row.
It was also given a high rating by the prestigious Standard & Poors credit rating agency.