The Benefit Company (TBC) is the local switch in the

Kingdom of Bahrain Bahrain ( ; ; ar, البحرين, al-Bahrayn, locally ), officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, ' is an island country in Western Asia. It is situated on the Persian Gulf, and comprises a small archipelago made up of 50 natural islands and an ad ...

handling ATM and POS transactions among other services. Established in 1997 with a special license from the

Central Bank of Bahrain The Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) is the central bank of Bahrain. It is a public corporate entity established by the ''Central Bank of Bahrain and Financial Institutions Law 2006.'' It was created on 6 September 2006. ''Decree No. 64 of 2006 with ...

as "Provider of Ancillary Services to the Financial Sector", it is the only financial network of its kind in the country.

ATM and POS

Benefit's initial services included connecting the ATM services of the local banks in Bahrain and handling the settlements. In addition, it connected the POS terminals to all the local issuers in the Kingdom.

GCCNET

In addition to local switching, Benefit is also connected to GCC Net, the main switch operating on all GCC countries. A connection was also established with Shetab in 2005; linking all BENEFIT users with

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

's only switch.

Payment gateway

In 2006, the company offered the payment gateway service, integrating more of the local banks onto one payment hub, allowing banks and their merchants to perform online transactions.

Electronic check clearing

In May 2012, Benefit started running the nation's

check truncation Cheque truncation (check truncation in American English) is a cheque clearance system that involves the digitization of a physical paper cheque into a substitute electronic form for transmission to the paying bank. The process of cheque clearan ...

system. Thus, enabling 29 banks in the Kingdom to settle checks the same day.

Member banks in the network

* Arab Bank Ltd. *

Bank al Habib A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

Bank of Bahrain and Kuwait The Bank of Bahrain and Kuwait (BBK) was established on 16 March 1971 in both the Kingdom of Bahrain and the State of Kuwait. Its shareholders consist of the general public, the government of Bahrain, banks and investment companies in Kuwait. B ...

Citibank Citibank, N. A. (N. A. stands for " National Association") is the primary U.S. banking subsidiary of financial services multinational Citigroup. Citibank was founded in 1812 as the City Bank of New York, and later became First National City ...

HSBC HSBC Holdings plc is a British multinational universal bank and financial services holding company. It is the largest bank in Europe by total assets ahead of BNP Paribas, with US$2.953 trillion as of December 2021. In 2021, HSBC had $10.8 tri ...

Shamil Bank of Bahrain Shamil Bank was a Bahrain-based Islamic retail bank licensed and regulated by the Central Bank of Bahrain, with commercial and investment banking activities. It has grown steadily to become one of Bahrain's leading financial institutions. Sham ...

Kuwait Finance House Kuwait Finance House ( ar, بيت التمويل الكويتي) (KFH) was established in the Kuwait, State of Kuwait, in 1977, as the first bank operating in accordance with the Islamic Sharia, Shari'a rulings. KFH is listed in Kuwait Stock Exch ...

National Bank of Bahrain National Bank of Bahrain (NBB) was established in 1957 as the first indigenous bank in Bahrain. They are a nationwide network of 25 branches, 61 ATMs, and over 4,000 points of sale terminals in addition to their branches in Abu Dhabi and Riyad ...

Standard Chartered Bank Standard Chartered plc is a multinational bank with operations in consumer, corporate and institutional banking, and treasury services. Despite being headquartered in the United Kingdom, it does not conduct retail banking in the UK, and around ...

Bahrain Islamic Bank Bahrain Islamic Bank is a commercial bank based in Manama, Bahrain, founded on 7 March 1979, and started operating from the beginning of the Hijri Year 1400 (2nd of Muharram) which was the 22 November 1979. It is the first islamic bank in the Ki ...

Ahli United Bank Ahli United Bank ( ar, البنك الأهلي المتحد) is a regional bank based in Bahrain. Its head office is situated at Manama and is the largest bank in Bahrain. It is present in 8 countries in the Middle East and United Kingdom. Ahli Uni ...

* Bahraini Saudi Bank *

National Bank of Kuwait The National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) was founded in 1952. It is the largest financial institution in Kuwait Kuwait (; ar, الكويت ', or ), officially the State of Kuwait ( ar, دولة الكويت '), is a country in Western Asia. It ...

National Bank of Abu Dhabi National Bank of Abu Dhabi (NBAD) ( ar, بنك أبوظبي الوطني) was a bank operating in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) until it merged with the First Gulf Bank in December 2016 to form First Abu Dhabi Bank. NBAD was the largest lender b ...

Khaleeji Commercial Bank Khaleeji Commercial Bank BSC (KHCB) is an Islamic bank, headquartered in the Kingdom of Bahrain Bahrain ( ; ; ar, البحرين, al-Bahrayn, locally ), officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, ' is an island country in Western Asia. It is situ ...

Mashreq Bank Mashreqbank PSC (Arabic: ''Orient Bank'') is the oldest privately owned bank in the United Arab Emirates. It was founded as the Bank of Oman in 1967. Today Mashreq provides conventional and Islamic personal banking services including deposits, l ...

* Al Salam Bank * Eskan Bank *

ICICI Bank ICICI Bank Limited is an Indian Private bank. It is headquartered at Mumbai. It offers a wide range of banking products and financial services for corporate and retail customers through a variety of delivery channels and specialized subsidiari ...

State Bank of India State Bank of India (SBI) is an Indian multinational public sector bank and financial services statutory body headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. SBI is the 49th largest bank in the world by total assets and ranked 221st in the ''Fortune ...

References

External links

The Benefit Company's Main Site

Central Bank of Bahrain's Main Site

GCCNet's main web site
1997 establishments in Bahrain Banks established in 1997 Banks of Bahrain Interbank networks {{Bahrain-stub