Overview

Retail banking digital transformation leaders across the globe have been influenced by the pandemic. As an initial response, the Retail banking solutions adopted an accelerated mode in improving their digital presence across the customer value chain. As they now ready to balance the immediate effects of the pandemic in terms of lost income and loan provisions, saved in most part by the forbearance from the government and central banks, the longer-term objective is to have enough capital to ride though this storm and build future capabilities with retail banking services. In that regard, most banks are aligned to the sustainable practices and are actively taking steps towards addressing their customer’s desire of them being more than just a financier. As more initiatives emerge from the bastion of banks, there are certain fundamentals that all banks have to adhere to. They are broadly categorized as follows.

Customer Centricity

Customer Centricity

This is the age of open retail and digital banking and open data sharing. It is a question of how banks make use of this landscape to have a better understanding of their prospect as well as customers and personalize their service portfolio. While this appears to be a mammoth task in itself, there is another critical dimension that adds substantial complexity – the demographic pattern of the customer universe. Each demographic segment starting from millennials need specific attention. Without the aid of new age tools and platforms, it becomes a daunting task.

Open Systems

Open Systems

Banks are recognizing that to turbo-charge with a front wheel drive at supersonic speeds mandates opening their systems, both for partnering with Fintechs as well as lifestyle partners, who cohort with their customer universe. In many cases, this ‘ecosystem build’ is emerging as one of the key business units alongside their product management.

Human Touch

Human Touch

Customer centricity is the key aspect of banking. For long, banks while recognizing the importance of human interactions in a certain part of their portfolio (namely wealth management), took their eyes off it in other lines of business. To gain back relevance, banking leaders have to humanize across channels – be it the call centre, branch walk-ins, or the digital platforms. Thankfully, there are technologies available which makes this possible, across demographic profiles and linguistic segments.

Regulatory Compliance

Regulatory Compliance

The period of forbearance is over, and the reign of penalty is in. Further accentuated by the pandemic, the digital platforms today need to be real-time. So, while other options are available, the banks need to commit considerable investment and strategic oversight to accomplish their compliance towards regulations.