RIYADH, 13 July 2003 — Six Saudi banks have refused to answer questions sent to them by Arab News regarding the measures they take to identify women who wish to cash a check if they do not have the new photo ID card or a passport.
Last month, Arab News learned that a women’s branch of a local bank here had been telling female clients to bring the new ID card for women or a passport to allow proper identification. The family card, which only mentions the name of the wife or daughters without a photo, was not accepted in that branch to protect women from others trying to impersonate them.
Arab News contacted the heads of media and public relations departments of seven Saudi banks to ask if these procedures were followed in their banks and whether they had received any directives from the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA) regarding the question.
Several heads of the PR departments in the banks told Arab News to fax the questions so they could direct them to the appropriate departments. The PR manager at the Saudi British Bank said: “Send it by fax. I don’t answer questions over the phone.”
Over a period of three weeks after faxing the questions to seven Saudi banks, repeated calls and requests to speak to the managers, Arab News received no reply. The only reply came from the PR manager of Al-Rajhi Banking and Investment Corp., who managed to reply to the questions within two days.
Saudi American Bank, The Saudi British Bank, Riyad Bank, Saudi Hollandi Bank, National Commercial Bank and Banque Saudi Fransi ignored the questions.
During the long process of chasing these managers, one assistant told Arab News that the matter of women’s ID cards was “of great sensitivity here.”
The office manager of the head of the PR department at Riyad Bank told Arab News that the bank would not answer the questions. No reason was given.
After three weeks of being ignored, Arab News decided to contact SAMA to ask them if any regulation had been issued to all Saudi banks regarding the requirement to show a passport or the new women’s ID card at banks for identification purposes.
Again a PR manager asked for a fax, this time to the governor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency.
After a week passed without reply, Arab News phoned the office manager of the governor who said that “only the governor can answer those questions and he is abroad.”
Several days passed. Arab News again made a call, this time to the office of the deputy of the governor. Another couple of days passed until someone from his office told Arab News that the fax, which he called the “muamalah” — i.e. “the case” — had gone to a certain department and wondered why it had not called back.
When Arab News called that department, the person there said that the answers to the questions in the fax would be ready by Saturday and sent to the governor’s office for signature. “You’ll have the fax ready and sent to you by Saturday,” they said.
Saturday came and went. On Sunday, the same person was not available. On Monday, he admitted that “the fax was given to another employee and his office is locked. He will be back in five days as he went to attend a course.”
The week after nothing happened. The person in the deputy governor’s office had become familiar with this reporter’s voice. He told Arab News to contact the manager of the Banking Department.
The call was made, and the manager, after hearing the whole story, said that the questions were legitimate and suggested contacting the manager of the Banking Investigation Department and gave Arab News the direct number.
There we were told to call the same person we talked to earlier. The fax, it appears, did not even pass by the Banking Department’s manager or he had no clue that it was in his office. There was a missing link. Though the office manager was helpful, he agreed that there was too much bureaucracy in SAMA. He wanted to help and said that he would find out where the missing link was. He said he would have the answer sent by fax on Saturday.
Three days later, the long-awaited reply finally came via fax from the office of the deputy governor. It had taken 20 days.
SAMA said it had issued instructions to all banks regarding the rules and regulations of opening accounts. In the rules, it said, methods of identification in local banks regarding Saudi women were in compliance with acceptable means of identification as defined by the Ministry of the Interior, which include women’s ID cards, the Saudi passport, the family card, or the old women’s ID card — without a photo — which was later canceled as it came before the family card, which also does not have a photo of female family members.
Regulation 200, it said, regarding the women’s ID card mentions that the bank will need written approval from the woman if it wishes to copy her ID or passport. If the woman does not wish to have her ID copied, a signature is taken from her guardian and the ID number, source, and expiry date is kept on condition that a guardian or an acquaintance is present or that another ID is copied.
SAMA said it had several times alerted banks to these regulations in coordination with the Ministry of the Interior.
