The bank already had the highest market share in terms of volume of payment services provided to state-owned organisations, according to Apisak Tantivorawong, KTB's president. But its fee-based income from such services is relatively low compared with that of other large banks, because most of its services are provided free to state-run organisations.

Fee-based income accounts for about 10 per cent of KTB's revenue, compared to 20-30 per cent at other large banks. Also, KTB does not receive fees from credit-card operations, because its Krungthai Card Ltd unit handles that business.

The bank plans to build up its payment services, in order to boost its fee-based income. "In the next four or five years, much of the bank's fee income is expected to come from payment services.

"We hope that over that period, the bank can offer the services to all government agencies," he said, adding that 40-50 per cent would be a suitable percentage for fee-based income.

Meanwhile, the bank's revenue from the Government Financial Management Information System, a comprehensive payment service for state agencies, are also only a small portion of the bank's fee income, because the bank has offered the service for only about a year now.

KTB serves 225 government agencies and holds about Bt340 billion worth of deposits from them, while government lending accounts for 5.2 per cent of its outstanding loans.

Somruedi Banchongduang

The Nation