Banks partners with WhatsApp, your way of banking will change

The number of words you can make in combination with the word Digital has only increased in the last year. And it is quite understandable, we have had initiatives like Digital India, Digitalisation, Digitisation, Digital world, etc impacting our day to day life.The impact of Digital India on India’s economic growth is supposed to be long-lasting. As the initiatives in the Digital India Scheme are all driven by technology.

Our governments for years have worked towards creating an economy that is more reliant on the internet and less on the paper-based economy. The incumbent govt provided a single name “Digital India” to all the digitization, digitalisation and other initiatives taken by govt to have a positive impact on our economy.

The trend in digital banking services of people has increased during the lockdown. In view of this, many banks have joined hands with WhatsApp. Under this partnership, basic banking services are being made available to customers through the messaging app. It is proving beneficial for both banks and WhatsApp. The Facebook-owned social media company has taken forward its existing partnerships with some big banks. These banks include HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Axis Bank, and RBL Bank.

Application Programming Interface (API) Integration has helped banks to provide basic services like balance inquiry, routine updates, moratorium facility, credit card statement and in some cases, savings account opening. The demand for such services has increased due to lockdown across the country. The reason is that during this time, branches of banks are providing only necessary services. Banks themselves are also encouraging customers to use digital services.

Let's take ICICI Bank for example. It has asked about 10 lakh users to apply for 'WhatsApp banking' services. At the same time, Kotak Mahindra Bank said that it is managing 15 lakh messages a month on the platform. Bijit Bhaskar, Head (Digital Channel & Partnership), ICICI Bank said, "We are very excited by the customer feedback. In view of this, we have added features like instant savings account opening, choosing a loan moratorium, ”said Deepak Sharma, Chief Digital Officer, Kotak Mahindra Bank. Used to This feature has been upgraded with WhatsApp. Like our Facebook page for regular updates on personal finance and the stock market in Hindi. Click here to like this page.

Deepak Sharma, chief digital officer, Kotak Mahindra Bank, said the channel is an upgrade on traditional SMS and IVR used by the bank earlier. "Due to the familiarity and simplicity of the platform, many digital inactive customers, who earlier used SMS or the bank's missed call service, have migrated to WhatsApp as their first digital channel," said Sharma.

The flurry of engagements on the channel has presented a lucrative avenue for business expansion in India ahead of the highly anticipated launch of UPI services later this year. While the service is free of cost for most customers, the partnership model between banks and WhatsApp is a mix of subscription and per-transaction model.

"The recent Covid-19 situation has underscored the imperative of quickly scaling services such as insurance, pension, banking and credit to consumers and small businesses," said Abhijit Bose, head of WhatsApp India.