Modern day bank customers are using the Internet and Apps on their smartphones and some banks are still catching up with demand. The analyst Mark Ryan is now predicting that online banking will disappear – a challenge for the industry.
The Internet has changed banking beyond recognition, much more so than cashpoints or credit cards. Most contacts between client and bank today happen online.
The industry is still catching up and some of the banks are struggling to provide their customers with what they wants in an era when technologies change at breath-taking speed – at huge cost.
Money Well Spent?
Some of the technologies the banks install at huge cost today will probably be redundant tomorrow. Mark Ryan, chief analyst at Extractable, a consultancy for digital strategies, in an article for «The Financial Brand» suggests the e-banking solutions of today won't last,
Ryan says the human voice – or voice recognition – will make online banking as we know redundant. The use of the technology by Apple has kickstarted the technology and the U.K.'s HSBC will start using voice recognition for the purpose of client identification later this year.
The Next Level of Technology
With voice recognition, the next level in digital banking will be reached. The identification of customers with the help of their voice will be used for transactions, payments but also to check accounts.
The linking of systems in a digital world means that bank clients will in theory be able to do their banking while driving their cars (or rather when being driven by their cars). Once customers no longer need to log into the websites of their banks to do their banking, online banking as we know it will change dramatically, Mark Ryan suggests.
Because customers no longer need the Internet offerings of their bank. This means that banks won't be able to use their websites to do marketing and to achieve cross-selling effects anymore.
Higher-Value Products
Banks will have to adapt to this change in habits. If they switch their Internet offerings to higher value products such as loans, mortgages or financial planning tools, away from the normal day-to-day banking, the average time their customers remain on their websites will increase.
Thus, voice recognition could even turn out to be of benefit to the banks: for customers, because their banking becomes easier. And for banks, because they can improve their service quality and boost the potential of the Internet services.
