Heading to the new banking applications

Innovation, and more "Innovation". This looks to be the constant when speaking about the bank of the future, but unfortunately for those that haven´t started to innovate, the future is now, something like "No Country for Old Men". I will now put some examples for applications that can make the difference in the vertical.

1. Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for banks.

The common problem to interact with systems it is the easy of use, friendliness, etc, whatever you call it. Natural Language to interact with decision making systems can allow a number of tasks and features. Combining the power of Big Data Analysis or no so big data but common data found in Core Banking glued with powerful artificial intelligence systems that allow the use of natural language for querying the system can make a real difference. For the interface the chances are: written text, voice commands or implicit alerts triggered to existing interfaces.

Customers can ask things like "How much I have been spending in clothing this year?" "What is my best investing option for home insurance?" "Please project my savings for the next 12 months".  Let´s think about the customer who can be alerted by an app in her mobile when trying to buy something that threatens her savings plan.

On the other hand banks can use this system with its task force, allow new staff to ask for advice when dealing with complex transactions or specific customers. Risk Management or Compliance can be greatly improved, safer and quicker decisions can arise from AI in this context.  The number of solutions derived from AI in banking is huge.

2. Social Networks Support
Banks can check a number of things in social, who say what about the bank or competition, what people like or dislike, and eventually answers with supporting advisory or guidelines to customers complaints or launches social campaigns. But people are gregarious, they like to met partners and doing business with each other. Sometimes are expenses shared within a group of people, so they need something to help them to split expenses, borrowing, paying and collecting money for special occasions. Families who can join forces for specific needs in a form of money savings or somebody who can prepay services and obtain discounts. Private social messaging can be useful to send alerts of invoices to overcome. Some banking services can use the security log-in from external user certification authorities like Google, Microsoft or Facebook and forget about complicated and tricky proprietary applications. Using a mobile application that complements the social support, customers can access financial advisory for savings, investments, money management.

3. Democratizing Credit Card Brands
Is it wise to use a high limit card for a low amount internet transaction? Maybe is just a matter of feeling safe.  If you have a low amount prepaid card you can use it to execute low amount internet transactions, to let your sons to use on weekends for going to amusement parks, etc. Such card is perfect for gifts. But here comes something different, a re-loadable gift card. Why you should throw away the gift card after consuming its money. In one way sounds ecological and on the other is a way to empower people that does not have banks accounts to have its own "credit card". Of course it is not a pure Credit Card but can use recognized brands such MasterCard, Visa or American Express. The business turn to complement the service  with discounts networks, and promotions.
Customers can easily load the basic card information to its mobile, card number and user id. Then customers can use its mobile instead the plastic and secure its use through a personal password and one time code when they are ready to pay for services or goods. In such application the customer can also load discount coupons instead of paper cut ones.

4. Social Inclusion
There are some initiatives to insert un-banked and under-banked in the banking system like the one partnered by FIS: http://waleteros.com/ :This solutions uses the same principles exposed with Remote Check Deposit, clients simply take a photo of checks and instantly receive the check amount less a low fee directly right in the mobile where the electronic wallet application resides. Really an easy piece of cake.
Other example is Kiwa they are a sort of micro credit facilitators. They manage the lending process having in one side organizations or institutions that put money available to lenders and on the other side they work with micro credit lenders, people who ask for small amounts of money to initiate or implement improvements in its business. Kiwa offers a set of analysts who are in charge of lender qualification and approval. Something like Kiwa is MrPresta, they use the same business model. but they are focused on people who sell stuff in "Mercado Libre", the auctions Latin American portal like eBay.

5. Breaking the egg

As the new born bird who needs to break its egg to be free in the nest, banks need to rethink some traditional behavior. When customers visit an on-line retail store such Amazon or eBay, they experience a comfortable environment, with a history of its recently viewed items and purchases, they receive news on new products that can be of its interest. They have offers and specialized verticals for music or videos. User can explore its shipping address or credit card information. Banks have information that can be used in the same way,  user should have chances to personalize its experience in the Bank´s portal, receive coupons or discounts from local providers, or special interest rates, be advised on investments. Banks need to think from its customers point of view and let away the baker spirit for a while. For instance one customer could make a list of projected expenditures and as soon as the month begins the internet bank system can present the available balance vs the monthly payments, as soon as the customer salary enters the account it can be divided and the customer can visualize the real status of its accounts.

I will come with other ideas in other posts, stay tuned.






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Favoring fashion in Services

When you see anybody using her iPhone or wearing a Prada outfit, you think about fashion, status, and related things like that. Bank Services can be in that fad.  Can anyone see such a thing applied to banks? Maybe the answer can pop up in thousands of different ways.  Out there are hordes of millennials and other older technology lovers who want the services the easy way and be considered as very valuable collectible pieces for their banks, in the same way, they impulse those services like a fashion trend.

It's clear that they do rely on their expensive gadgets to access banking services. FISERV conducted a survey in 2013, where they found that Millennials use more primary banking services than other generations. For they Debit Cards, Savings Accounts and Mobile Banking is top priorities.  The  "Trends in Consumer Mobility Report" from Bank of America revealed that out of 1,000 U.S. adults, 47% admitted they would not last a day without their smartphone. About 85% of survey respondents check their mobile devices a few times a day, the report concluded. And the amazing "Believe or Not" the fact is that 96% of adults between 18 and 24 years old believe using a mobile phone is more imperative than using the Internet or taking care of personal hygiene. 

The same report shows that around 84% of interviewees declared to have visited branches but an astonishing 75% of them completed their transactions online or with a mobile device. It´s important to understand that everybody is wary about the importance of financial decisions.

No matter how much the Millennials depend on technology, they look for trustful advice. Something that leads them to branches. It's imperative for banks to bringing financial instructional programs in the form of seminaries, continuous education programs, and have the right people at hand to answer specific questions. This should be the best complement to FAQs and Chat on Line. For people, is very important to set financial goals and be advised by trusted financial sources such as branch employees. Under this point of view, the branch´s personnel will be fully trained in financial advisory, thus, the common monetary old branch transactions should be solved by other means but human intervention from the bank side.

So, what is "cool" in banking services? What does attract Gen Y to the bank? Advisory? Financial safety based on good advice? Which online services are useful on one side and profitable in the other? The profit comes from a long relationship with customers, so, does any loyal customer guarantee profitability? And every answer will find mobility as a part of it.

Customization in services can play a key differentiation among contestants for the major, prize: millennial. Since they, Gen Y, use mobile technology extensively, it is logical to think about customized service platforms and services, ranging from personalized debit cards to omnichannel experience.

Usually, we can distinguish 3 kinds of players; global banks, country banks, and small or local banks. Commonly, global banks are the first to adopt new technology. Old legacy systems often mean anchors that do not allow full deployment of new services without an enormous effort, sometimes with a bit of trial and error, the bad news is that big banks usually own those old legacy systems. Country Banks are committed to new technology and innovation in different levels of activity, but small ones are not stars for carrying out innovation as first players, they do rely on proven technology, that's because they can not afford to fail in this field, but in contrast, they use technology and services that has been 100% tested and guarantee a good user experience.

No matter if the brand new service and technology promise to catch up a lot of customers. In the end, the everlasting services and technology must be reliable. And it´s clear that when a successful service or technology emerges, it is "on fashion", and continues to transform into a classic, a commodity. Meanwhile, any effort addressed to understand Gen Y will be the best investment for future profit.


 

 

My bank is everywhere!

When you proudly say: This is my SON! is because you are so happy to let everybody know about your beloved son. Banks and other business should dream about proud customers speaking up: "My Bank" or "My Library" or whatever the case. But, when a customer, with eyes wide open and with a grateful surprise says "My Bank is everywhere!" and the following days proudly claims or feels something like "My Bank!" it means that the bank has done the right things.

The fact of being everywhere is a clear consequence of Omnichannel infrastructure and strategy. How hard or easy for any bank to be a real omnichannel service provider depends some times on the Core Banking System that supports every transaction.  Sometimes the internal infrastructure demands a lot of work, a brand new Enterprise Bussiness Bus, new servers, etc. Others just need to customize its intrincated or state of the art technological platform. Technically the solution exists.

The average customer wants to access her bank services at any time and be recognized as soon as she starts the choosen channel. As I stated in other opportunities, the user experience has run to be "Holy Grail" for Omnichannel experience. Consistency and real time integration need to be present, service quality, transactions availability, security (this demands other chapter) and performance are the key players to grade high in omnichannel.

One customer sometime asked "why do I need to invest all this money in multichannel services?" The answer can be so simple, "To be in the wave", nevertheless is not only being in the wave, it means to be full competitive, be able to keep and attract customers and develop healthy  relations that translate into profit.

Today,  with the enablement of digital channels and the advent of a 100% digital generation, the presence of multiple channels relying on a strong, multifunctional and diverse omnichannel platform can make the difference between desperate efforts of surviving or flourish. Any bank should understand that they will have diverse kind of customers, those old fashioned that can´t live without branches and the other pole who does not want to step into any branch. From them, the divergent are the last ones, because they look for convenience for ubiquous banking, they do not care to have a strong relationship with specific bank officers but with the bank. This mixture of interests force banks to have a lot of channels available to be used 7x24 all year long. Changes comes slowly, as demographics switch to the new wave of digital enabled ones.

Customers behavior changes from country to country, from region to region and from tribe to tribe. As a marketing specialist friend says: Now we have tribes of consumers, global groups that look for specific features and that are identified under the same consumer´s flag. A number of banks have been betting on branch transformation using models of video terminals, self assisted intelligent deposit  terminals and other devices but their goal to have all branches without personnel has been fruitless, since there are people who want to speak face to face with a human instead a video monitor.

Regarding this problem, I remember about the evolution of savings accounts user´s data. Back in 1994, in Columbia, South America. One popular bank decided to implement debit cards to replace passbooks. The project looked to produce a lot of savings for the bank, reduce the use of ink ribbons, passbooks´ distribution, be ahead of competition and a lot of more etc. But failed miserably. An important number of customers lived in rural areas and they rejected the idea of not seeing its movements printed in their passbooks.  Currently they have implemented massively the use of debit cards and vast number of customers rely on the information that can obtain at eny ATM or using internet or mobile channel, nonetheless they still have passbooks.

Prepare the blueprint, aprove it and then build it.

Most of us have dealt with opportunities like buying an sound system, dress or a house. The first thing we do is to be clear about what we like to have from our purchase or more, about our project if building a house is the case. The same principle comes to our hands when we deal with Omnichannel, strategy, planning, lots of planning need to be deployed before look after technology solutions. In the same way that you won´t buy a bolt whitout knowing if fits in that nut. Yes, it is possible to use special tools to our purpose of bolt fitting but this can turn the solution more expensive that the solver by itself.

A good planning stage will save time and money. As I pointed out above, the final technical solution comes from the current bank core and satellite systems. In some cases the solution will modify and wire interfaces among systems, others will replace entire solutions and the extreme case will need to build all the infrastructure from teh ground up.

The last year, one customer who liked to replace its widows forms based administrative interface was looking for a painless or at less not so painful process to have all interfaces in a web based environment. The real problem was to migrate its client-server architecture to a SOA architecture. They began their journey early the year before, and after hired a renowned company and suffered a failout, they opened wide their eyes just to find out that they need a omnichannel solution anchored in its platform. As a matter of fact they are now working with the omnichannel strategy in min, but they are no more the leaders they wanted to be.

Be prepared to win

The evolution of bank channels, sane way as retail touch points,  starts from the single channel, where customer uses the only available channel and the bank had centralized data information , then came multichannel, where custmers access their bank through any of the independent channels implemented at the bank and the bankcollected customer´s data from siloed channels by functional silos. The next step, put the bank in control over customer information but customers didn´t have the desired User Experience and banks still works in functional silos until Omnichannel emerged.

We can have channels such Branch, Contact/Call Center, ATM, On line banking, Mobile Banking, IVR Banking, SMS Banking, Kiosks and Self Service Banking (multifunction ATMs), Social Banking, Sales Point Banking, and even some people uses the term of Tablet Banking for other channel, I do prefer to call this last one: App Banking.

As you see, Branch stared everything and persists, that´s because we humans like to feel "human touch". Well, to have all headcount aware of Omnichannel opportunities, every group of workers need to be comunicated and understand what omnichannel means in terms of data and information that flows through all implemented channels and is available in different administrative or customer service stations. Banks need to have implemented a really structured communication workflow that starts from its administrative heads.

When the bank has addopted omnichannel, the principles of discussed branch transformation, where any employee can access any customer data in real time at the right time, the customer can start to experience the new service level, an amazing customer experience.

The strategy should break the culture of functional silos and siloed channels, the bank´s personnel should turn to see the customer in a 360° view and be able to interact with the customer using this information power that constitutes a rich arsenal. These weapons, for building lasting relationships and to generate the possible best profit, come from an omnichannel culture that comes hand in hand by Ubiquitous Banking or OmniBank, you name it.

What about banking cores in Cloud?

The first time that something like Cloud bases solutions for Core Banking came to my mind, looks like "costs saving model" or "economy of a scale model", technically speaking the chance to have more control over code in just one location or distribution point than the common model of individual installations if you know what I mean. The versions of hell could come to an end. The model was so convincing that some other colleagues were thinking the same. "Yes, that´s the solution we were always looking for!"

And the dream did not end at that point, looked easy to grow. I came up with the design of a sort of Applications Market, a place where, the software house,  customers, partners, and developers with the right license could publish applications in such a way that the original product could be enhanced or enrich. The company´s president liked the idea, said it looked revolutionary. But then we faced restrictions from local regulations. As a matter of fact, there are few countries that allow financial institutions to have their Core systems installed in the Cloud. You can hear about Temenos with some installations in Cooperatives in Mexico and its efforts to have its product, T24, over Windows Azure. Other initiatives come from Finacle, Denarius (actually DenariusOnline), Misys, and others, but a company that is striking hard in the market is the german: Mambu.

Mambu has a presence in more than 30 countries, mainly in startups from developing countries. There is still a long path to discover, starting with the right strategy since we have sensitive data, unranked providers, service availability. What if somebody like a fierce group of hackers decides to attack the digital fortress and at least cause service blockage?  The currently accepted solution uses private clouds, with few services running in this model. Institutions need to be cautious, adopt strategies that start with services that do not compromise their data, something like loan services and things like that.

Mambu's experiences in Africa are worth checking since the service is addressed mainly to the unbanked. What about unbaked in the rest of the world. Roughly around 60% of the population is underbanked or unbanked, What a Chance! If any financial institution offers cloud-based services for around 60% of the population and that service generates just $1 in profits per customer, it´s is something to take into account. Servicing people that live far from populated and serviced centers can benefit from this kind of service.

Security is one key point that keeps financial institutions considering cloud more than the advisable, but there are other key points to consider, surpassing the old debated cost savings and opening doors to other subjects like agility, ubiquity, response speed, image, brand, etc. Salesforce is offering the first service for banks, based in the cloud (http://www.salesforce.com/industries/financial-services/) Banks that opt for this service can nurture their leads from multiple channels, personnel from the bank will access all information from cloud repositories. Security is no more an issue with capital letters, with appropriate policies, and infrastructure data is fully protected from unauthorized access.

Looks now that regulatory agencies in the majority of countries are some steps behind since local regulations do not allow to hang data in the cloud for financial institutions. But, it is just a matter of imagination and disruption to put business-enabling services in Cloud Servers or hiring services as salesforce1. Technology does never sleep and banks should do the same.

#Cloud #CoreBank ##banking #SaaS

Flexible risk-based pricing models. Is it possible with outdated cores?

The term is quite simple to remember "What-If", something that has been used ever and ever for simulations. Yes, and Risk is a kind of simulation when Banks deals with loans such as mortgages. What-If the customer has a good credit record, what if the customer does not? Is it possible to negotiate a lower interest for a  higher down payment?

So, in cases when banks try to capture more customers, it is very important to be flexible, to have a 360 degrees view of customer´s products and historical behavior for existing customers and have other means to qualify new customers. Something that old fashioned legacy systems have never offered.

This only feature reflected and available in all channels can make a remarkable difference among all the competency. But, why is that not all banks have implemented such tool? Well, mainly because current core systems do not support this feature and sometimes, maybe the in almost all cases, the process to transform or implement such functionality is complex, expensive and sometimes incomplete. There a number of things to consider, beginign with customer file records (the repository commoly known as CIF: Customer Information File), customer´s products in the bank, credit records from credit bureaus, data from other sources such employment history, insurance, etc. So, in plain words, modifying an aging core system to fullfill the highest requirements for achieving risk-pricing is a titanic enterprise. At all sights the first possible solution should be to aquire an standalone application that integrated with the core system. This means more interfaces, more user screens but at the end, the institution could have its solution up and running.

Using the right data analysis it is possible to identify the customer´s  position in the right relationship tier that the bank has defined. It means that depending on the customer pre-qualification, some prices, fees, rates and considerations are autmaitcally applied, this can lead to less negotiating time expent with every customer. Chances to deploy campaigns oriented to capture more customers and turn leads into profitable sources. As San Francisco based Bank of the West defines, this is a "realtionship pricing".

i f we consider the difficult track to walk starting from old legacy core systems, the more advisable solution is to migrate to a new core banking solution, with modern technology, far away from Cobol and related technology elements. Since a system, to deal with all the features that risk-pricing stands for, requieres technical features such services management to capture and share information with external systems.  And the chances do not end with servicing current customers or to aquire new ones that come from other institutions but to serve "unbaked" or "underbanked". There is an endless possibility to create and maintain risk analytics databases. 

There is a "must consider" step under the current consideration, to expand service capabilities to all channels, it means renewing or uptating Internet Banking, Mobile Banking and Self Service Hardware (ATMs, Automatic Deposit Terminals, Kiosks, etc). This question always arises when speaking about modernization, and the answer is "Do it now", because doing it now is not a short process, it requieres to change a lot of things, begining with administrative process and diving deep in software changes and sometimes hardware. Always thinking on old cores as the starting point.

This lead to outstanding competitivity, because chances to keep gold medal customers increases as rates and services get better, and on the other hand attracts good profiles to obtaint the same benefits. Other page has to do with risk reduction because high rates and stiff rules for customers with low qualification that constitute high risk reduces the chance of loosing money.  With this model in production , it is easier than for other banks to approach to unbanked in some specific services and to attract them. 

For institutions that own an old cores, this is more that changing habits, renewing process and implement a new island to its archipelago. Thinking about chances to have a Frankenstein living under the hood of modern servers, upgrading and aquiring a new core and implement new products and services around  this last one is a better choice.

 

PCI DSS Requirements

This is a brief compilation of PCI DSS requirements; it is possible to tell software from infrastructure responsibilities. PCI DSS fundamental requirements are 12 (twelve) that are categorized into six main containers as follows:

A. Build and maintain a secure network

1. Install and maintain a firewall configuration to protect cardholder data
2. Do not use vendor supplied defaults for system passwords and other security parameters

B. Protect cardholder data

1. Protect stored cardholder data
2. Encrypt transmission of cardholder data across open, public, networks

C. Maintain a vulnerability management program

1. Use and regularly update anti-virus software
2. Develop and maintain secure systems applications

D. Implement strong access control measures

1. Restrict access to cardholder data by business need-to-know
2. Assign unique ID to each person with computer access
3. Restrict physical access to cardholder data

E. Regularly monitor and test networks

1. Track and monitor all access to network resources and cardholder data
2. Regularly test security systems and processes

F. Maintain an information security policy

1. Maintain a policy than addresses information security

Currently, PCI DSS 3.0 standard compliance should be observed. It is important to point that PCI DSS is focused on security, it tries to ensure that payments are made business-as-usual. No more, no less.

Security problems exists inside organizations. more that outside threats. Employees who do not follow adequate security principles can put their company´s data on risk. Consequently, the first step every organization needs to do is to educate its people on security habits.
PCI DSS 3.0 states that is mandatory to observe:

A. Increased security and Awareness

1. Password education for users
2. POS Security training and education

B. Greater Flexibility. 

It means that every organization can adopt the best security model, based on its business model and goals, that does not mean to implement weak security rules, but adopting the best solution. So, the new requirements in version 3.0 textually express the following

1. "Allows for organizations to implement the password strength that is appropriate for its security strategy"
2. "More flexibility to prioritize log reviews based on organization’s risk management strategy"

C. Security is a shared responsibility.

3.0 is clear and direct to state that security matters to all participants. Support, maintenance and development constitutes a main point to consider in this respect. Commonly, institutions rely on third parties for those tasks.  Outsourcing brings a security treat that apparently is outside business boundary, but it is not. Just think that if you have in-house solution, this means one point of failure but with outsourced services there are various points. Due this problem, PCI DSS 3.0 defined responsibilities that service providers must comply.

These days, other channel that demands special attention is mobile. Since mobile devices are very common and users tend to make a massive use of mobile networks and devices, close attention is needed to comply with version 3.0.

PCI DSS 3.0 started to be in effect by January 31, 2014 but  organizations responsible for complying  with PCI DSS and PCI App Data Security have until January 2015, it means that version 2.0 will be accepted as valid until December 2014.

To summarize, the  new requirements for PCI DSS are:

• 5.1.2 - evaluate evolving malware threats for any systems not considered to be commonly affected;
• 8.2.3 - combined minimum password complexity and strength requirements into one, and increased flexibility for alternatives;
• 8.5.1 - for service providers with remote access to customer premises, use unique authentication credentials for each customer;
• 8.6 - where other authentication mechanisms are used (for example, physical or logical security tokens, smart cards, certificates) these must be linked to an individual account and ensure only the intended user can gain access;
• 9.3 - control physical access to sensitive areas for onsite personnel, including a process to authorize access, and revoke access immediately upon termination;
• 9.9 - protect devices that capture payment card data via direct physical interaction with the card from tampering and substitution;
• 11.3 and 11.3.4 - implement a methodology for penetration testing. If segmentation is used to isolate the cardholder data environment from other networks, perform penetration tests to verify that the segmentation methods are operational and effective;
• 11.5.1 - implement a process to respond to any alerts generated by the change-detection mechanism;
• 12.8.5 - maintain information about which PCI DSS requirements are managed by each service provider, and which are managed by the entity;
• 12.9 - for service providers, provide the written, agreement/acknowledgment to their customers as specified at requirement 

and the new requirements for Application Data Security Standards (PA-DSS) are:

• 5.1.5 – payment application developers to verify integrity of source code during the development process;
• 5.1.6 – payment applications to be developed according to industry best practice for secure coding techniques;
• 5.4 - payment application suppliers to incorporate versioning methodology for each payment application;
• 5.5 - payment application suppliers to incorporate risk assessment techniques into their software development process;
• 7.3 - application supplier to provide release notes for all application updates; ( I like this one)
• 10.2.2 - suppliers with remote access to customer premises (for example, to provide support/maintenance services) use unique authentication credentials for each customer;
• 14.1 – provide information security and PA-DSS training for supplier personnel with PA-DSS responsibility at least annually.

Please refer to PCI official site for further information on changes from version 2.0 to 3.0

Trends: Intelligent Deposit demistified

I know this can sound like an echo or an annoying phrase: Reduce Costs. This phrase will be present in a number of posts but it´s quite important to point.   Something that Banks look for is to obtain more profit, so, if they are able to gain more Revenue and reduce costs, everything looks fine. We could visualize also the chance that has not increase in revenue but the cost reduction strategy makes the difference. The intelligent deposit concept is quite easy: accept bills and checks without envelop and providing on-line processing, it means that customer´s funds are inmediately available after completing the deposit transaction.

In such effort, one of the current trends in Banking Services is the so called: Intelligent Deposit. The purpose is to transform the way that Banks offer services for deposits, shrink queues at branch offices at the teller stations and reduce time needed for transaction execution from start to end.  Currently, users (customers) have become very familiar with Self Deposit stations, this means banks and customers have adopted the concept and are ready.  Banks report operational savings, but there is something else, consumer adoption has surpassed expectations in many cases creating a 2^nd line business case mainly due increase in branch sales thanks to productivity increase. And more important, customer´s loyalty increases with this solution.  In some studies, using advanced machines for Intelligent Deposit, the average customer can be served in just 1 minute; it is only the 30%- of the transaction service time needed at teller station. As a conclusion, banks that do not adopt intelligent Deposit Solutions are clear losers, since they won´t attract customers due apparition of service and loyalty gaps, worse than that, they will lose customers.

According to RBR, there is a global increase on Deposit Automation trend. It is possible to see that USA and Brazil are leading this change in the Americas since they are adopting solutions to replace envelop deposit. The overhead of envelop deposit is crunched by allowing customers to deposit checks and money directly in the machine, it means zero hand writing for deposit forms, proof of deposit as soon as the transaction ends with checks images printed in the receipt.  One of the key drivers in Intelligent Deposit is the improved efficiency for check deposits.  In USA alone, the first forecast predicted to have around 135.000 ATMs for 2018 with this feature enabled. It looks reasonable to see this feature as a commodity in the coming years.

To sum up, there are 3 main advantages when Banks opt for intelligent deposit:

• .       Cost reduction through operational efficiency
• .       Improvement in CX
• .       Revenue generation

Just imagine the possibility to enable users to perform transactions at any time and location faster than at branches, reducing time needed to access brick and mortar facilities and with less wait time in queue or none.  Some banks are taking advantage of those savings to sell additional products. Any change in process that reduces steps is a good change, more if it comes with such advantages as the 3 aforementioned.

But, further reasons to adopt intelligent deposits, among them is fraud reduction, since the mechanisms used in such terminals allows positive recognition of cash and checks that were deposited.  Bills are validated and counterfeit ones are rejected immediately. As for checks, those undergo a validation process using the MICR line and an OCR validates CAR and LAR along an on-line scanning feature that prepares the check for remote deposit, sending the image to first line ACH system. Finally it eliminates empty envelops and the need of personnel activities that hast to do with manual empty of containers boxes at specific times during the day for manual processing. Customers receive its receipt that verifies its transaction and timely credit for its deposits.

On the other hand, banks can extend the deposit cut-off because they are no longer dependent upon physical check processing.  Also, they can expand its delivery channel by locating ATMs with intelligent deposit enabled at strategic locations, let´s talk about residential or business areas considered in increasing demand for branch services. It´s said that for the same cost of a classic brick and mortar branch office, it is possible to expand the branch in a neighborhood, installing ATMs with intelligent deposit enabled, in such way the branch office is not only a small spot in the map but a large octopus alike with virtual tellers disseminated in an specific space, each of them separated by a few streets.

Banks are facing a new channel together with increases in amounts deposited and confirmed adoption from its customers. AS for now, there are considerations for banks, they should look for solutions where processing speed and consumer experience will go hand and hand, allowing customers to execute bunch bill recycling, bunch and single check deposit for improved item processing, bunch and single bill deposit for deposit and payment transaction automation. Thus, you can envision additional services like payments, ticket selling, SIM cards dispense, top up cards and more.  Not bad huh!

Welcome. This is the starting point. Este es el punto de partida

Creo que esta es la forma más adecuada de difundir, ideas, noticias, captar opiniones (espero que existan algunas) Este día empiezo con el asunto entonces.

Y claro, para llegar un poco más lejos en audiencia, algunas cosas las publicaré en Inglés. No es que el español tenga nada malo, pero inglés habla un gran cantidad de personas inmiscuidas en tecnología y es necesario difundir los pensamientos e ideas interesantes. La democratización del conocimiento viene desde ese punto.

Let´s start!
Technology for banks, what a big field! Yes, but are there  real big and enormous possibilities for new technology and innovation addressed exclusively for banks? Maybe yes, maybe not. As for any other industry, you should look for great thing happening in other places,. take the good ideas, modify and bring them to your home. But no simple, according to studies made by Gartner, for instance, there will be such changes like Internet of  Things where every single appliance is connected to internet. Starting from that point and moving to other fields like for instance nanotechnology, the tech-universe is expanding  at fantastic speed, it is not possible to catch up. From time to time, nevertheless,  comes an outstanding revolution that changes everything! What to say of a number of researching centers, we could point at easily to identify such Microsoft Labs  or complicated ones like CERN. Anyway. from that bunch of sources, there´s the chance to find things like Object Detection and Recognition, Automated Reasoning based on data and data-mining, etc. Putting together all of those technologies is possible to imagine a sort of them making click to offer new services and functionality for banks. Just imagine that you never again need to carry your debit card to take cash from ATMs, just because there is an intelligent software that recognize your face or scans your eyes.

This is all about, trying to find advances in technology, try to discuss how to apply Information Technology and other sciences for the Bank Industry.

I hope of having a good start, and more important to continue.