Eurobank S.A.

The overview of the market and the best selection of suppliers through qualitative, quantitative and “green” criteria as well.

The Bank selects its suppliers, through specific rules, procedures and policies, with a sealed bid process that can be performed via electronic market in many cases under circumstances of  transparency, fair competition and accountability.

All companies that potentially cooperate with the Banking industry, directly or indirectly. These companies are both small/medium enterprises and also multinationals, concerning IT or Non IT goods and services. 

The assessment is performed at least once a year, but several ad hoc reviews are taking place in cooperation with the Group IT General Division, to ensure that there is proper use and feedback of data.

The Bank and Group Vendors evaluation is being held through three main pillars:

1) Evaluation during bid evaluations/ tenders, using specific model and weights.

2) Evaluation per project, where project managers evaluate the vendor during the project and also at the end, by creating specific vendor profiles that cover the full range of services offered.

3) Annual vendor evaluation where the overall Vendor – Group relationship is presented to the Management.

For the above there is a common  Supplier evaluation process, applied throughout the Eurobank Group, and also an integrated evaluation platform that includes as default, green criteria as well.

The methodology applied is the same for all vendors and it is conducted by a number of evaluators coming from the Business Units involved and the Group IT (regarding IT equipment supplies), who are the main recipients of goods and services supplied by the Bank.

More specifically, the Bank in 2019 conducted evaluation for IT suppliers, consulting services, technical services and construction projects, as well as for other goods and services, adding for quality reasons and risk management specific indicators which count:

a) the degree of dependence of suppliers from the Bank in relation with their total turnover and

b) the degree of dependence of the Bank from its suppliers in relation with their total turnover in the Organization

The Bank implements in a fully electronic way the whole cycle of supplies, integrating the payment circuit for effective management of all the supply requests. Through the uniform evaluation platform of suppliers, the Bank evaluates both quantitatively and qualitatively its suppliers. It counts and weighs all the basic financial data from the balance sheets of suppliers, while it completes the evaluation with qualitative elements through specific targeted questionnaires to specialized evaluators.

The questionnaires cover the whole scope  of the relationship with the respective supplier, in matters of commercial, contractual etc., as well as in matters of wider response, sensitivity and support of the needs of the Bank, within the framework of business ethics and corporate responsibility.

In addition, both in the Request For Proposals issued by Eurobank for conducting tender evaluations and also in the context of its contractual relationship with the cooperating suppliers, particular reference is made by indicating specific terms, to comply with environmental legislation and labor legislation in order to preserve employment and insurance conditions of the working staff who offer services for the Group.

For transparency reasons and assurance of interests the “Due Diligence Process of New Supplier Integration in the Bank” has been configured and is under review and enrichment in order to be aligned with the Sustainability and Climate Change Strategy. Based on the above procedure, the new supplier is called to both submit published balance sheets and all the necessary financial data in depth of three years, and to inform the Bank concerning the legal form of the company, as well as for its beneficial owners and legal representatives.

This Framework, that is covering all phases of the procurement cycle (RFP, supplier evaluations, contracts), is institutionally protected by the Group Procurement Policy. The goal is the improvement of the cooperation framework with the suppliers at a business level and the maximization of the benefit for the Group, not only at a cost level, but also at the quality of goods and services, under the greater goal of formation of new data in the whole market.

Moreover, the Bank runs an e-invoicing program and has agreed with specific suppliers to invoice in electronic way with data that inform directly its central ERP, saving time and paper consumption.

Under the same framework, e-auctions are held through the Ariba marketplace system for specific types of goods and services, thus maximizing both the economic benefit and effectiveness, improving the environmental footprint, saving paper consumption from the submission of economic and technical tenders. 

Meanwhile, the established Group Procurement Policy ensures the compliance and protection of the Policy both in relation with the necessity of supply and the containment of operational cost.

The Bank  uses its own systems for the evaluation and presentation of performance results of the suppliers, without any cooperation with a third party solution

Participation of selected evaluators from the Bank’s units.

These evaluators are appointed in cooperation with the Group Procurement, Group IT and all units involved, as recipients of the services they are called upon to assess.

This is an objective process with a range of evaluators, able to cover the whole financial and qualitative cooperation with each supplier.

There is no specific place of implementation for the supplier evaluation. Suppliers can be either Greek or foreign companies, with or without a representation in the Greek market.

The result of the evaluation process of the suppliers is a final weighted objective grade for each vendor, quantitatively and qualitatively, either annually or ad hoc during a year. This grade contributes to the development or diversification of the Bank’s relationship with suppliers, aimed at more effective cooperation and maximization of the benefits for both Eurobank and the market where it operates.

In particular, through this procedure, the following are ensured:

• Meritocracy in the choice of v suppliers-partners through objective criteria

• Transparency of selection and evaluation procedures

• Promotion of cooperation for mutual benefits

• Improvement of supplied products and services

The Bank, during 2019, cooperated with 811 suppliers, of which 183  were from the IT sector, while the rest 628 offered other goods and services. Concerning the sector of contracts, the Bank kept 1.416 active contracts in 2019, from which 621 were compiled as new during the year.

In general, the benefits of the supplier evaluation process are the following:

Cost saving
Ensuring the quality of the goods and services offered
Creation of cooperation relationships that are based on a mutual benefit
Creation of new market standards aiming to improve all solutions and options offered.
Effectiveness in time to procure
Ensuring transparency and meritocracy in the supplier selection process

Promotion of Green procurement and ESG issues