The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) has approved new procedures that aim at encouraging Egyptians to open bank accounts for the sake of enhancing financial inclusion and providing more flexibility for banks when dealing with their clients.

The new procedures allow opening current and saving banking accounts, deposits, and purchasing certificates using only the national ID without the need to provide other documents such as birth certificates.

They also allow opening bank accounts for micro-sized establishments, craftsmen and self-employed persons in order to enable them to benefit from the banking services, especially in securing the required finance for their projects to grow.

The procedures also include raising the volume of daily and monthly transactions for the mentioned categories.

Since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis in Egypt in March, the CBE has adopted a package of stimulus procedures to contain the pandemic's impact on the national economy and to alleviate the harsh repercussions placed on citizens because of the outbreak.