One advantage mobile banking
has over banking on a computer is that the customer has anytime accessibility.
Internet banking has become a
norm in everybody’s lives. However, the main problem is the inability to access
the internet with a PC or a laptop 24 hours of the day. This is why most banks
have a mobile application, which is easy to access and gives the customer anytime
access to their banks. Customers can now check out their account details, get
their bank statements, perform transactions like transferring money to other
accounts and pay their bills sitting in the comfort of their homes and offices
or while they are on the move.
Mobile usage has seen an
explosive growth in most of the Asian economies such as India, China and Korea.
In fact, Indian smart phone users use their devices for over three hours a day,
besides having a phone conversation. According to the Cellular Operators
Association of India (COAI) the mobile subscriber base in India hit 40.6
million in the August 2004. In September 2004 it added about 1.85 million more.
The explosion as most analysts say, is yet to come as India has about one of
the biggest untapped markets.
The biggest advantage that
mobile banking offers to banks is that it drastically cuts down the costs of
providing service to the customers. For example an average teller or phone
transaction costs about $2.36 each, whereas an electronic transaction costs
only about $0.10 each. Additionally, this new channel gives the bank ability to
cross-sell up-sell their other complex banking products and services such as
vehicle loans, credit cards etc.
For service providers, Mobile
banking offers the next surest way to achieve growth. It helps service
providers increase revenues from the now static subscriber base. Also service
providers are increasingly using the complexity of their supported mobile
banking services to attract new customers and retain old ones.
Challenges faced
Although mobile banking is
poised to become the big killer in the mobile application arena, banks going
mobile for the first time need to tread the path cautiously.
Mobile banking through an SMS
based service would require the lowest amount of effort, in terms of cost and
time, but will not be able to support the full breath of transaction-based
services. However, in markets like India where a bulk of the mobile population
users phones can only support SMS based services, this might be the only option
left.
On the other hand a market
heavily segmented by the type and complexity of mobile phone usage might be
good place to roll of WAP based mobile applications. A WAP based service can
let go of the need to customize usability to the profile of each mobile phone,
the trade-off being that it cannot take advantage of the full breadth of
features that a mobile phone might offer.
Mobile application standalone
clients bring along the burden of supporting multiple mobile device profiles. According
to the Gartner Group, a leading wireless computing consulting organization,
mobile banking services will have to support a minimum of 50 different device
profiles in the near future. However, currently the best user experience, depending
on the capabilities of a mobile phone, is possible only by using a Standalone
client.
Things you can do when you have
mobile banking access
·
Account Balance Enquiry.
·
Account Statement Enquiries.
·
Cheque Status Enquiry.
·
Cheque Book Requests.
·
Fund Transfer between Accounts.
·
Credit/Debit Alerts.
·
Minimum Balance Alerts.
·
Bill Payment Alerts.
·
Bill Payment.
·
Recent Transaction History Requests.
·
Information Requests like Interest
Rates/Exchange Rates.
