IBK Branch Manager Received Tens of Millions in Bribes... Suspended for 3 Months

Employee 'Self-Loans' Followed by Branch Manager Bribery Scandal
Yoon Jong-won, IBK Bank President, Proclaims 'Trust' but...

Yoon Jong-won, President of IBK Industrial Bank of Korea

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Sun-mi] It has been confirmed that a branch manager of the state-run Industrial Bank of Korea (IBK) was disciplined with a suspension for accepting tens of millions of won in money and gifts in exchange for providing convenience to customers in transactions.

According to the '2019~2020 IBK Audit Report' provided by the office of Yoon Chang-hyun, a member of the National Assembly's Political Affairs Committee from the People Power Party, from July last year to June this year, Branch Manager A, who worked at a branch in Gyeongbuk, received tens of millions of won from bank customers and underwent a special audit within the bank.

Branch Manager A received tens of millions of won transferred multiple times to his IBK account under his name from customers in exchange for providing business consultations and transaction conveniences, which he used as household funds. The bank conducted a special audit following reports of suspicious transactions such as bribery and on the 31st of last month, imposed a three-month suspension on Branch Manager A. IBK stated, "The types of disciplinary actions include dismissal, suspension, pay reduction, and reprimand, and suspension is a considerably severe penalty."

According to materials from Representative Yoon's office, IBK conducted 180 internal audits (excluding subsidiaries) this year, including this case, and issued five disciplinary actions. Last month, Deputy Manager B, who worked at a branch in Hwaseong, was dismissed after it was revealed that from March 2016 to the first half of this year, he executed real estate mortgage loans worth 7.6 billion won under his family's name for personal gain.

IBK has established the 'IBK Code of Ethics' and 'IBK Employee Code of Conduct' as behavioral standards that executives and employees must comply with to prevent corruption and foster a clean workplace culture, but repeated misconduct by employees continues to surface. This is why there are calls to further strengthen the internal control system.

The 'IBK Code of Ethics' and 'IBK Employee Code of Conduct' prohibit employees from engaging in work for profit outside their duties, forbid immoral acts that damage the bank's credit and reputation for personal gain, and prohibit actions that harm the bank's interests for the benefit of themselves or their relatives.

Since his inauguration, IBK President Yoon Jong-won has consistently prioritized "restoring customer trust" in management and emphasized that the bank will "be reborn as a bank that earns trust." At the 59th anniversary ceremony held at the end of July, President Yoon stated, "We must also focus on restoring damaged trust," and proposed measures to enhance employees' compliance and ethical awareness for customer trust restoration, including ▲ the establishment of the IBK Proper Management Index and ▲ the enactment of the IBK Ethics Charter.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.