In a strategic banking shift for credit policy makers, banks decided to abandon their strict policy towards financing expatriates and bedoun to allow the return of financing for non-Kuwaiti employees working in the private sector, with an installment financing ceiling of up to 70,000 dinars, and payment terms of up to 8 years and without a guarantor, according to banking practice that has become common in recent years, as long as the business entity is bankable.
Banking sources told a local Arabic daily that “banks have stopped their policy of closing down a large segment of expatriates and bedoun working in the private sector from borrowing, and decided to expand towards them with unusual facilities and conditions since the start of the corona pandemic, as it is likely that various job segments in the private sector will benefit, even low wage earners.”
The sources stated that “the banks that tend to lend to non-Kuwaitis again have reduced the conditional salary ceiling for the consumer loan from 500 dinars as a minimum to 300 dinars, and they have also reduced the required work period to be 4 months as a minimum instead of the year and more they required, provided that the value of the consumer loan is determined according to the value of the salary, and the deduction percentage determined in accordance with the instructions of the Central Bank of Kuwait.
As for the recently applied banking controls for lending to employees from outside the government sector, the sources indicated that “the most prominent of which is that the customer must fulfill the conditions prescribed by the supervisory regulator in terms of loan eligibility, and that the customer has a credit history free of default, and that he is an employee of a company listed on the Kuwait Stock Exchange, or according to the bank’s clients’ list, or if it enjoys adequate financial stability and efficiency, and if the customer is a bedoun, he must, in addition to the above, have a valid security card, and for an appropriate period.
The sources referred to raising the ceiling for lending to expatriates and bedoun working in the private sector to 20 times the salary for those with high salaries, and in some cases it reaches 25,000 dinars, which is the upper limit allowed for consumer loans.
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