The digital banking race is getting fierce. TP Bank, HD Bank, VietCapitalBank and VP Bank have recently said they are implementing eKYC – online customer onboarding and identity verification – on mobile apps.

Analysts say that this is an important step for banks to accelerate their digitization process.

Meanwhile, Vietcombank, one of the ‘big four’ has launched VCB Digibank, the digital banking app. It affirmed that this is a new outstanding service with consistency of experience, easy to operate, and integrated with many preeminent security solutions.

Banks will have to spend big money for initial investments, but the spending will bring big benefits. If investments in technology increase banks’ operation costs by 7 percent, for example, the revenue increase they will bring to the banks will be double that, 12-15 percent.

Banks will have to spend big money for initial investments, but the spending will bring big benefits. If investments in technology increase banks’ operation costs by 7 percent, for example, the revenue increase they will bring to the banks will be double that, 12-15 percent.

In fact, becoming digitized is a must for commercial banks. Banks have to do this to better serve clients, who set higher requirements nowadays.

According to experts, the banks’ digitization process will be in three phases. In the first phase, banks will learn about the process and carry out the digitization of some products and services.

The official digitization in the second phase has a higher level of digitization, up to 60-70 percent of banking activities.

In the third phase, banking operations will be fully digitized. Some banks may set up digital banks as completely independent banks.

Commenting about the implementation of the digitization process, Luc said this depends on banks’ business strategies. Some banks are still in the first phase of the process, while others are in the second phase and some are in the third phase, with digital banks of their own.

Tien Phong Bank, for example, has LiveBank, and VP Bank once had Timo, which are relatively independent, but they mostly serve the existing clients of the banks.

Though banks put digital transformation task as a top priority, their preparations and readiness for digitization are different.

The ICT Index 2019 Report showed that BIDV was in the No 1 position in readiness for IT development and application. The bank got a 0.75 score in ICT Index in 2019, followed by Nam A Bank, Techcombank, TP Bank and MBBank.

Mai Lan 

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