04 May DBS launches app-only bank in India
Last week Development Bank of Singapore (DBS) launched Digibank, a mobile app-only bank in India that allows the customer to open an e-wallet and a savings bank account without visiting a bank branch. The app will work on the principles of Artificial Intelligence. DBS has partnered with Kasisto, a US-based fintech to provide its KAI platform to power the virtual assistant in Digibank. The feature can provide real-time answers to questions and additions will be done to its database as it converses with more humans.
The mobile-app can be downloaded from an app store. Any banks customer can use this app to open an e-wallet and a bank account. Digibank can be converted to DigiSavings account once the AML KYC details are approved of the customer. For KYC compliance, the customer needs Permanent Account Number (PAN), Aadhaar and biometric authentication. DBS has tied-up with more than 500 Café Coffee Day outlets for biometric verification service. The app also uses tokenisation where the verification happens automatically without human interference, for verification instead of OTPs via SMS. The customer can also request an agent to collect the documents.
Once the account is opened, the customer will get 7% interest rate on the savings and will also get a cashback upto 10% on shopping. There is no minimum balance criteria which can lead to extra fees or charges. DBS claims to open the e-wallet in less than 2 minutes without the need of any signature and paper. The digital wallet can be used for paying utility bills and other payments across different merchants. With the savings bank account, the customer gets a Visa-enabled debit card with which unlimited ATM cash withdrawals can be done. The bank account takes about 3 days to open.
Piyush Gupta, CEO DBA bank said that “The bank is aiming for 5 million savings accounts in India in the next four to five years through its new Digibank model”. He also highlighted that initially Digibank will offer only savings, but will expand to include investments and lending in coming months.
DigiBank is a fantastic idea to allow paperless banking with innovative solutions.
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