With this in mind, a survey was made of the banks' training needs and an in loco study was conducted of inter-bank training structures in Spain, Belgium, Great Britain and France. These steps had no practical results, however, because the 25 April coup occurred immediately after. After the nationalisation of the banks in 1974 and 1975, the Coordinating Committee for Inter-Bank Training was set up and took some sporadic action but was incapable of establishing a consequent, ongoing bank training programme, offering structured, comprehensive, integral, sequential training to improve the qualifications of Portuguese bank employees, improving productivity or responding to the new challenges of information and telematics. It was only later, on 10 January 1980, on the initiative of the Bank of Portugal, that the Bank Training Association (AFB) was set up by public deed, as the direct predecessor of The Portuguese Bank Training Institute (IFB).
The Bank Training Association was an independent body whose object was vocational training and the development of employees working for its members, by means of vocational training courses and refresher, re-qualification and specialisation courses. It was allowed to cooperate with any public or private, national or foreign organisations to pursue this object. The following banks were founding members of the Bank Training Association.

Banco Borges & Irmão
Banco Espírito Santo e Comercial de Lisboa
Banco Fonsecas & Burnay
Banco de Fomento Nacional
Banco Nacional Ultramarino
Bank of Portugal
Banco Português do Atlântico
Banco Pinto & Sotto Mayor
Banco Totta & Açores
Crédito Predial Português
Montepio Geral
União de Bancos Portugueses

The association's governing bodies were its General Meeting, Board of Directors and Board of Auditors and the Training Advisory Council was a consultative body for planning and monitoring training activities. The following members were appointed to the governing bodies for the period from 1980 to 1982.
 

Banco Nacional Ultramarino – Chair
Banco Totta & Açores
Montepio Geral

Bank of Portugal – Chair
Caixa Geral de Depósitos
Banco Espírito Santo e Comercial de Lisboa
Banco de Fomento Nacional
Banco Fonsecas & Burnay
Banco Português do Atlântico
Board of Auditors
Banco Pinto & Sotto Mayor – Chair
Crédito Predial Português

Ana Maria Bruno da Costa – certified auditor

 

The banks ran the Bank Training Association through the General Meeting and Board of Directors.
The Training Advisory Board was a consultative body that planned and monitored the Bank Training Association's activities. It consisted of the personnel or training managers at the member banks and heads from the three trade unions (North, Centre and South and Islands).

 

The first Board of Directors of the Bank Training Association was as follows.

Mr Brás Teixeira
Mr Nogueira de Brito

Mr Lopes Alves
Mr Silva Pereira
Mr Pires Lourenço

Mr Ferreira Neto

Mr Herlander Estrela

Mr Francisco Lacerda
Mr Pecurto Abelho

Mr Fernandes de Almeida
Mr Ferreira dos Santos
Mr Pereira Torres

The association's day-to-day running was coordinated by the Secretary-General, a position to which Dr Francisco Monteiro, a director from the Bank of Portugal, was appointed.The Bank Training Association was set up in 1980 and although it organised some sporadic activities in 1980 and 1981, it only began to take firm steps in 1982, when it began to organise specific training. Although it was not systematic, the association was endeavouring to respond to the most pressing requests from the banks and unions.

 

Introduction to Organisation and Methods;
Introduction to Data Processing;
Basic Principles of Teleprocessing;
Internal Audits;
Audits of Computer-processed Systems;
Transactional Analysis;
Teacher Training;
Credit Insurance;
Bank Security;
English;

Seminar on the topical subject of "Portugal and Accession to the EEC", which was such a success in Lisbon that it was given in Oporto and Ponta Delgada, Azores.
The Basic Training Courses began on 18 October 1982, achieving the main goal behind the creation of the Bank Training Association, which was an old aspiration, dating back to 1972, as we have seen.
In October 1984, the AFB launched the first vocational training course using distance learning. At the time, the financial institutions were having to reflect on their ability to adapt to an increasingly competitive reality demanding more and more quality from their human resources.
The shortage of training staff and the structures needed for coherent preparation of banking employees also meant that new training methods had to be adopted.
Distance learning proved to be the best strategic option for facing up to the challenges that made it necessary to train a large number of employees in a short time, while economising on human and financial resources without jeopardising the quality of the teaching.
By beginning distance-learning vocational training, the Bank Training Association was a pioneer in providing training to bank employees all over the country, including Madeira and the Azores, wishing to study and improve their qualifications without having to stay away from work for long periods of time.
Distance learning proved to be so convenient and effective that its use soon spread to other courses and was also the basis for later consultancy activities in Eastern Europe and the Portuguese-speaking African countries.
In the next few years, new activities were undertaken at the Bank Training Association until it became part of the Portuguese Bank Association as The Portuguese Bank Training Institute on 1 January 1986. The most important were as follows:

- Course for banks' middle and senior management launched, including Economics, Banking Operations, Monetary and Financial Analysis and Law for Banking (1983)

- Cooperation scheme with Banco Nacional da Guiné-Bissau to take stock of training needs and give basic training courses (1983)

- Basic Vocation Training Distance Learning Course launched in mainland Portugal and the self-governing islands (1984)

 

- Classroom teaching decentralised with courses for new recruits and refresher courses in Oporto (1984)

 

- Training programme set up for Banco de S. Tomé e Príncipe (1984)

- Specific Training Courses extended to Oporto, Madeira and the Azores (1985)

- Meetings held with banks' heads of department to assess training needs (1982-1985)

The activities of the Bank Training Association from 1982 to 1985 on the basis of the number of participants,  exceeded 17,000.Five years after it was set up, the General Meeting of the Bank Training Association on 25 November 1985 decided to make the AFB part of the new Portuguese Bank Association as The Portuguese Bank Training Institute, effective January 1986.
 

The Activity of The Portuguese  Bank Training Institute  (since 1986…)

After the Portuguese Bank Association was set up in 1985, the Bank Training Association (AFB) changed its name to Bank Training Institute (IFB). It became part of the bank association on January 1986 during a process that symbolically accompanied Portugal's accession to the European Economic Community. The treaty was signed in 1985 and came into force on 1 January 1986.

The Portuguese Bank Association, set up under decree-Law 215-C/75 of 30 April to pursue and defend the common interests of its members, was formed "to promote and practice all acts that may contribute to the technical, economic and social progress of its members' activities and to pursue and defend their interests with regard to any public or private, national or foreign entities." This included using The Portuguese Bank Training Institute to foster the training and professional advancement of banking personnel under the terms of Chapter VI of its statutes.
According to these statutes, the object of The Portuguese Bank Training Institute was "basic vocational training and refresher, retraining and specialisation courses for bank employees and education at a number of levels in fields relevant or connected to banking". It was allowed to cooperate with any public or private, national or foreign entities to pursue these ends.
The Portuguese Bank Training Institute now had its own budget and was supposed to cover its expenses with the income from the services it provided.
Continuing the work done by the Bank Training Association and therefore with the goal of improving the qualifications of Portuguese bank employees, The Portuguese Bank Training Institute undertook a series of initiatives aimed at setting up an integrated, sequential training structure to make it a true banking school with basic and intermediate training and higher education. It was therefore able to provide financial and other institutions and, as a result, the banking population in general, candidates for banking jobs and people working in the financial sector with safe, methodical, coherent progression in their careers. The courses that were launched for this purpose were:

-The Advanced Bank Management Course, in 1987
-The Regular Bank Training Course, in 1989
-The The Portuguese School of Bank Management, in 1991
-The General Bank Apprenticeship Course, in 1992
-Virtual School, in 1997
-WebBanca – Online Bank Training, in 2000