Digital Banking: The Talk of the Town

Digital Banking is all about the transformation, where the consumer rather than the technology, is in the driver’s seat, and this MATTERS.

It’s about digital money deposits, withdrawals and transfer of money from one account to another. It’s also about Account Management to loan management to paying all your bills digitally.

Digital Banking essentially entails the leveraging of technology, where banking services are delivered over the internet, by involving high levels of process automation and web-based services.

Digital banking, in simple words, is emulating 90% of the services provided by a conventional bank branch digitally, via a mobile app or through net banking in your computer browser.

Welcome ‘Digital Banking’. Welcome to the virtual world of  banking services!

Just as the word “virtual” is put up, you might wonder about the channels existent to avail such services. Let’s take a look at a few.

Today, the main channels of digital banking are the Android and iOS apps of the respective banks and their browser-based websites. These apps are easily available in different app stores like Amazon Appstore, SlideME, Samsung Galaxy Apps, Mobile9 and so on.

For example, SBI has SBI Yono, SBI Anywhere; ICICI Bank has iMobile. HDFC has HDFC Mobile and Pay Zapp. Kotak Mahindra’s Banking app is Kotak 811, while Axis Mobile provides Axis Mobile.

We also have Payment Banks committed to the inclusion and service to the last mile like PayTM, Vodafone m Pesa, Airtel, Fino, Indian Post, Jio and so on.

In this race, we are also joined by Neo banks and Challenger banks (Read ‘Tomorrow’s Bank’)  like Revolut, N26, Monzo, Atom, Yolt, WeBank, Moven, Fidor, and MYBank to name a few. These banks are an important part of the emerging cohort of  FinTechs which puts customers at the center of everything.

They are the banks which are reinventing the practices and processes associated with the traditional banking. A new type of digital bank (often working solely through a mobile app) which exists without branches.

These are 100% digital banks. Neo banks don’t have the license and they rely on a partner bank to operate. On the other hand, Challenger banks have the full banking license and offer full suite of banking products. They compete independently and on equal terms with traditional banks or digitally manifested traditional banks. 

They offer:

• Reduced costs
• Advanced features
• User friendly interfaces
• Customized reports
• Fast account openings ( between 3 to 10 minutes)
• International ‘Multi Currency’ Payments
• Instant ‘Multi Currency’ Payments
• 24/7 support
• Vaults and Expenses Analytics

All these to ensure simple, secured and seamless transactions!

Listing some of its many features:

• You can apply online for opening a savings or current account from your desktop or mobile. A manual call from a bank representative follows, who then completes verification from a remote branch. 
• OTP, video authentication and upload of scanned documents are proceeded with. This enables low cost zero balance account.
• 24/7 query solutions by chatbots are available in your app or net banking facility.

• Provides a highly secured, encrypted money transfer.
• Enables 24/7 money transfers at minimum or no extra fees, and displays their records whenever necessary.
• Electronic payment of bills to the pre-registered payees.
• Offering customized pre-approved all-purpose loans to the customer via a digital channel.

Some of its many advantages will surely help you in forming a fair view of digital banking and its multi-faceted applications:

• Visiting a branch and spending precious work time is eliminated.
• Paying your bills online, keeping track of your transactions and tab on your spending has become easier.
• Customized approval for a loan via Artificial Intelligence using CIBIL in minutes for a customer.
• Avail discounts on your favorite activities right there from your banking app.
• Digital Banking provides with a virtual debit card, whenever you wish to generate one. Without a permanent CVV and duration of 24-48 hours, these are much safer.
• Real-time interbank payment is now the norm through IMPS while BHIM (Bharat Interface for Money) and UPI (United Payment Interface) enhance the interbank payment security.
• Multiple money applications can be synced together. Online budgeting was never so easy. Real-time figures, anytime, anywhere.
• Multiple sources of revenue for the bank. Cost of providing digital banking services is a fraction of branch bank services.

Like any other novelty, digital banking also comes with its own set of disadvantages:

• Not possible without a stable internet connection.
• With scraping of Aadhaar for authentication, the model of digital verification that’s the cornerstone of digital banks is at risk.
• Chatbots and Robo advisors are not always the best option for the query. Unless they have the algorithm to learn from new questions, sometimes they loop back to the same answer for different queries.
• When products like FD, which are linked to the performance assessment of a bank employee, are done online, no particular back employee gets its credit. This leads to disinterest in that product in the bank employees of that branch where it’s registered.

(Source: TribuneIndia.com)

While banks and FinTechs take all precautions to ensure security, it’s always advisable to know the dos and don’ts of digital and online banking. Here are some of them:

• Always keep them password protected.
• Change your passwords and security settings regularly.
• Always visit your bank’s secure Internet Banking site directly.
• Always verify your domain name.
• Log out of your Internet Banking account the minute you complete transactions.
• Use dedicated/secured  WI-FI networks only.
• Always use, and update Antivirus software to keep your information safe.

Safety tips while using a mobile app for banking transactions:

• Never save your mobile banking log-in and password on the phone.
• Never leave your handset unattended.
• Always lock your phone to prevent unauthorized use.
• Notify your bank as soon as your mobile is lost or stolen.
• Update the apps regularly.
• Keep an eye on your account balance and transaction history regularly.

With FinTech being touted as the future of digital banking, understand how in reality it helps:

• Via NLP (Natural Language Processing) and ML (Machine Learning), FinTechs like Niki.ai help creates Chabot for banks. It replies with the best possible answer combination from its knowledge resources. Chatbots are now common in every digital bank, waiting to solve your queries 24/7.

• FinTechs specializing in Artificial Intelligence and ML (Machine Learning) help in data analytics of consumer preferences in every banking segment. This helps the bank not only upgrade its products as per consumer demand but also aids in providing customized offers for each customer.

• They also help create programs for robust back-end risk management and fraud detection. This risk management is the backbone which helps the bank lend to customers with minimal risk.

• FinTechs develop packages which identify and suggest operational bottleneck reduction to ensure a seamless operation of services.

• When you move money around different bank accounts via IMPS or NEFT, in the final step, you view a web page of CCAvenue or Atom Technologies. They are among the several Payment Gateway products, from different FinTechs, which help you transfer cash around with absolute security and non-hackable encryption.

From Monolithic applications to client-server technology to components and services, to the latest in the offering ‘ Banking as a Platform (BaaP)‘, the banking industry is ever evolving. And it’s definitely for better business offerings via better services, more agility, and viability.

If you want to stay competitive in the financial market by meeting sophisticated customer expectations, we at TEKNOSPIRE gives you that power and provides strength to your seamless transformation to the digital world, so that your services are agile, adaptive and scalable, so that your solutions to your customers are simple, convenient and consistent – hardware ‘independent’.

Our ‘FinX’ is a Digital Banking suite, integrated into your core banking system, helping you and your customers to engage with each other ’round the clock’ through convenient and engaging digital features. We work alongside you so that the customer gets secured, seamless experience – Anytime and Every time.

With Banks and FinTechs coming together, banks and FIs can be rest assure that the Regulations, the Security, the Real-time assessment, the Risk management, the agility and the ever evolving ‘innovation’ is well taken care of.

Teknospire’s  ‘Bank in a Box’ – ‘FinX’ is all this, and a lot more you can ask for.  Should you need more information about Digital Banking Engine – ‘FinX’, please message us for a free demo HERE.

Did I mention, that FinX main features include:

• ‘Open architecture’,
• ‘Cloud-ready’,
• ‘API enabled’,
• ‘Secured’,
• ‘Omnichannel’
• ‘Customized’ banking experience…just to name a few.

Digital banking is surely the “next big thing” to watch out for in the ‘near and far’ future!

Thinking of the loan disbursements and collections, or value-added service delivery, or it is about B2C and agency network interfaces, Teknospire’s Digital and Mobile Financial Platform is the answer to your requirements.

Whether it is about catering to army and farmer’s ecosystem or providing secured and seamless shopping experience to your customers, whether it is about managing and analyzing the data  to realigning your business strategy so that your customer gets what he wants, we cover from India to Zambia, from Zimbabwe to Mozambique, from UK to US to Europe. With our solutions deployed in these countries, with a power-pack army of 1800+ agents, we are there for you, with you, 24/7.

Stay tuned to this space to know more in our upcoming blogs for more insight.

References:

• Dos and Don’ts of Digital Banking

• FinTech companies can help banks

• Digital Revolution

• ‘Customized’ banking experience