ATM

The Banking Sector in the UAE

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The global economic crisis in 2008 had a great impact on the U.A.E. Several banks reported that there were high non-performing loans from 2009 to 2011. Thankfully, the economy recovered well and quickly after the financial meltdown. The reason that the U.A.E. could recover so quickly, was because they immediately set up an additional liquidity facility of around 14 billion dollars, which was available to the banks should they need it, but was luckily not really used. This crucial move stabilized the banks, and prevented further repercussions from the financial crisis. With the proactive steps taken by the government, as well as the blessing of natural crude oil, the economy of the U.A.E was able to bounce back quite effortlessly from what seemed like complete bankruptcy to most people.

There are around 23 local banks in the U.A.E., as well as 28 foreign banks operating there. These banks also have special Islamic banking, which has become increasingly famous in recent years. There are different kinds of accounts available, and foreigners have the option of opening their bank accounts either in the local currency, or in a foreign currency. Almost all the banks in the U.A.E. allow their customers to avail of personal Internet banking. The country in general is technologically savvy, and almost everything can be done over the web. Apart form this, all banks have ATM facilities, and customers of one bank can use the ATM of another bank. There is also a number of business banking facilities available to the large number of businessmen in the country. Current account holders can make cheque payments for all of their day-to-day expenses. Based on the credit of the account holder, overdraft facilities are also available to current account holders.

Whether you having personal or corporate banking needs, the banks in the U.A.E. are more than capable of helping you reach your goals. Even though they did meet with a slight set back due to the financial crisis, they have showed great power in being able to recover so fast, when most of the world is still reeling from the aftermath of the economic meltdown. The Central Bank of the U.A.E. has laid down several guidelines in 2011 to regulate loans and other banking services offered to individuals in an attempt to control all the banking to ensure stability. The export of oil from the entire gulf region has doubled since the year 2009. They exports have now reached 1 trillion Dollars. It is expected that by 2020, the figure will reach 2 trillion Dollars. With such promising figures, it is evident that the banking sector in the U.A.E. is really very strong.

Branchless Banking The Financial Services Of The Future

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There are some exciting and innovative times ahead for the banking industry. The world’s financial organisations always looking for new ways to offer customers the sophisticated levels of service they want while simultaneously cutting costs, and one exciting area of development is branchless banking.

Customers are already extremely familiar with the functionality on offer at the average ATM machine and a large proportion have also got to grips with all of the excellent services available through online and mobile banking. Now, there are engineers and inventors quietly working on ways to boost the brilliant services provided by these technologies, making it possible for people to find a full range of banking functions on offer from a computerised terminal.

There was once a time when such a proposition seemed unlikely to take off, but that was long before the days of self service checkouts at local supermarkets and swipe cards to get on and off public transport. As the world becomes increasingly technologized, a far greater portion of the population is highly computer literate and on the look out for all innovations that can help them better utilise their free time.

The convenience of branchless banking services is one of its major selling points. The ability to access financial details on the go or at a conveniently placed ATM machine rather than having to set time aside to visit a physical branch is something that greatly appeals to today’s time-poor workers. What’s more, the range of different online and computer facilitated services available means that there are a good range of options for people to choose from.

While some customers will always prefer the option of speaking to a teller, others welcome the anonymity of sorting out their finances at a fully functional ATM machine or paying bills via their phones. It’s up to banks to consider the needs of their far reaching customer bases and provide the most appropriate service for them all. As technology continues to grow, it is increasingly likely that more and more customers begin looking for branchless solutions for their banking needs.

Retail teller machines are huge development when it comes to the potential of branchless banking. These, unlike ATM machines, tend to be cashless, and are instead designed to talk customers through the various policies and services the bank offers in a no pressure environment. This will appeal to customers who want to learn about the products open to them, but who want to have plenty of time to consider their options as well as avoid a potential hard sell.

RTMs can already reduce queues and pressure in bank branches and the fact that they could be installed and maintained in areas where a full branch isn’t feasible means they’re sure to offer ever greater options to customers in the future. The further development of RTM and ATM software designed to simplify financial services will help make it increasingly easier for the average customer to get the information and services they need while also helping banks cut costs.

Tips To Personal Banking

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With the advent of personal banking services, things have become a lot more convenient for people. However, you need to be little cautious in order to safeguard your personal information from any third party.

You can find several banks providing personal banking services. However, it is advisable to follow certain tips while using personal banking that will be helpful to you.

Primarily, it is imperative to begin by ensuring that the right security software is installed on your computer and ensure it is fully updated so that you could get the best personal banking services. This is essential as it will help you to keep viruses away from getting on to your computer. Likewise, it is advisable to keep changing your password at frequent intervals so that nobody else could access to your personal banking account. This would help you as no one else will be able to use your account.

Another point to keep in mind is regularly tracking and checking your transaction records to prevent any unusual activities hampering your peace of mind. Additionally, in case there are certain transactions that you dont remember, you should take immediate action to make sure that that anyone has not committed any kind of identity theft over you.

Furthermore, it is advisable never to access net banking through links in emails. It is also recommended not to enter any confidential information on suspicious websites. You should delete spam emails right away.

Personal banking is reliable, safe and successful if you make sure to remember these tips and safeguard yourself while doing your banking online. There are various types of dangers on the Internet especially when you are dealing with such confidential valuable information. With the help of personal banking services, you do not need to visit your bank each time you need to complete a transaction. The greatest advantage of personal banking is that you can get instant cash from your ATM and you will always have an evidence of all the transactions that you will make.

So dont wait anymore. Get your personal banking account today.

Finacle Mobile Banking Solution

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With mobile devices becoming integral to people’s lives, banks are seeking to leverage the ubiquity of mobile phones to create a cost-effective distribution channel, rapidly innovate, extend reach across segments and improve convenience and security of use. However, due to consumer concerns regarding security, the adoption of this channel for value-based transactions has been limited. While some consumers prefer browser-based mobile banking, others use applications that can be downloaded to create a rich interface on the handset. Additionally, the diversity of hand held devices presents a unique challenge for banks seeking to optimize services delivery across the gamut of devices and customer segments.

A truly secure mobile banking solution built on open standards, for increased agility and flexibility, can prove invaluable for banks. The solution must also intuitively address the hurdles posed by multiple form factors and access mechanisms in the mobile space.

Finacle mobile banking solution empowers retail and corporate banking customers with access to banking services through SMS, GPRS/ 3G and USSD-enabled handsets, leveraging a single platform. The solution provides a secure, multi-lingual channel for banks to innovate by easily deploying new services with improved time to market. The end user experience thus created is richer and truly convenient.

Finacle mobile banking solution integrates easily with disparate host systems, core banking solutions, payment networks and third-party applications. The solution leverages Infosys mConnect, the indigenously developed middleware, which orchestrates mobile transactions between users’ devices and the Finacle universal banking solution. Infosys mConnect handles the multiplicity of form factors and access mechanisms on multiple devices to provide a context and device independent view to the transaction server. This presents banks with a powerful channel to service customer segments ranging from the mass affluent to the under-banked or unbanked, surmounting the challenge posed by the diversity of mobile devices.

The ubiquity of the platform adequately addresses the challenges of encryption, communication, synchronization, image resizing, downloading and security. This ushers in the advantages of reduced integration by leveraging common interface messages, maintenance and deployment costs.

Customer On-boarding

Finacle mobile banking enables the bank’s existing customers to be directed to use the mobile channel for banking and payment transactions through the following modes:

Mobile banking facility requested by sending SMS request in prescribed format

Registering for mobile banking through the bank’s Internet banking site

Phone banking leveraging the bank’s tele-banking call center

Mobile Banking and Payments

Customers are enabled to perform several financial transactions on their mobile phones using multiple languages and across multiple time zones. The functional capabilities of the solution include:

Account management and requests like balance inquiry, account aggregation (within and with other banks), mini statements, among others

Term deposit and renewal

Funds transfer (self and third-party accounts with multi-currency support)

Local and international payments with support for expedited payments

Bill presentment and payment

Remote deposit capture

Account origination, Forex rates and calculators

Cheque status inquiry, cheque book requests and stop cheque requests

Customer personalization including account setup and marketing preference

Transaction approvals for corporate customers

ATM and bank branch locator

Remittance request, enquiry and statement

Peer-to-peer payments

Business-to-business payments

Contactless payments

Support for administrative tasks like secure mails to relationship manager, approvals, password/ PIN change, block credit/ debit/ ATM card, customer billing, data synchronization and self-audit

Key Modules

Mobile Financial Management

The solution offers unmatched support to manage finances on the move. This helps banking consumers make informed decisions. A comprehensive set of tools is provided to enhance financial management.

Quantitative (such as EMI calculators) and qualitative analysis tools (such as budget vs. spend analysis)

Transaction tagging

Product selectors and comparators

Virtual financial advisory services through video chat on mobile

Alerts

This module empowers customers to subscribe and receive a wide variety of mobile alerts. The solution supports both push and pull alerts along with customizable alerts via integration with Finacle alerts solution. The module also allows the customer to set preferences and limits for alerts and configure ‘do not disturb’ timings.

Value Added Services

Finacle offers a gamut of value added services that provide extended convenience and comfort to the customer. These include:

Mobile commerce

Mobile ticketing

Mobile top-up for prepaid card recharge

Mobile advertising, based on location, user profile and actions

Mobile remittances to charity causes

Mobile wallet

Demat and stock trading services

Security

Finacle mobile banking solution offers state-of-the-art security through optimized measures. The solution offers:

Two factor authentication – PIN encryption

J2ME MIDP 2.0 support for SSL/ TLS

Encryption of data stored on mobile phone

Support for binary XML

Enabling and disabling of mobile numbers

Support for additional authentication mechanism

Business Benefits

Greater Customer Convenience

Finacle mobile banking solution empowers banking customers to make informed decisions by providing them with an invaluable set of financial management tools on the mobile handset. These tools help in quantitative and qualitative analysis, as well as in the selection and comparison of financial products.

Reduced Turnaround Time

Finacle mobile banking solution has a robust integration framework which allows it to function in tandem with disparate host systems, core banking solutions, payment networks and third-party applications. This translates into reduced go-to-market time for the bank as well as support for legacy systems.

Robust Inclusivity Framework

Finacle mobile banking solution leverages Infosys mConnect to smoothly hurdle the challenges posed by the multiplicity of form factors and access mechanisms on multiple devices to provide a context-agnostic view to the transaction server. This enables banks to include, through the mobile channel, its various customer segments, ranging from the HNWI to specific unbanked communities, surmounting the complexities of diverse location and dissimilar mobile devices.

Maximize Innovation

Banks can leverage Finacle solution’s indigenously developed middleware Infosys mConnect, to configure an unlimited palette of services from any channel, to the mobile space, with ease. The need for development of new back end services is precluded due to the availability of a banking solution behind the mobile interface. Finacle also provides the flexibility to deploy services over the existing online banking platform or through a standalone delivery channel interfaced directly with the relevant host systems. This ensures the rapid delivery of a comprehensive range of financial services, embellished with new innovative features, on mobile devices.

Business Benefits

Robust Security

The solution offers extensive application security features like URL encryption, referral URL check and session management to provide a robust security framework. The solution also supports OTP (one time password), which provides a two factor authentication mechanism for users transacting with downloadable mobility client. This enables the bank to offer products that are highly secure and geared to withstand the onslaught of security threats associated with mobile transactions.

Cost Savings

The solution presents banks with the advantages of reduced integration by leveraging common interface messages, maintenance and deployment costs. This translates into significant cost savings without banks having to compromise on features or the range of devices supported. The mobile banking solution is inherently independent of the network service provider, obviating the need to build a business model that involves costs and profits sharing with them.

Customer Delight

Finacle mobile banking solution enables banks to offer the convenience of comprehensive anywhere anytime banking, using GPRS, mobile browser or SMS. It supports a wide range of mobile devices and mobile browsers. Banking customers can query on account balances and make fund transfers. Banks can also proactively send timely information to customers in a completely secure environment, whenever a customer-defined event occurs. The solution’s self-service capabilities empower customers to manage their banking activities better. The solution also addresses data transmission and storage related security concerns adequately, delivering a truly streamlined customer experience.

Effective Features Of Breeze Mobile Banking

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One of the most interesting things about technology is that when developers introduce different applications to the public, they mistakenly believe that the more features and the more complex the features, the more impressed customers will be. Unfortunately, many uninformed consumers are sucked into buying products because they are loaded with what appear to be incredible and robust features. However, these people soon discover that all the fluff is just that, meaning the features are usually over-rated and rather than making the experience smoother, they actually make things more complicated and time-consuming.

When Standard Chartered Bank developed Breeze, the online and mobile banking solution that runs on iPhone and iPhone, they wanted bank customers to have a genuine, user-friendly application with features that added true value to the overall experience. The final product rolled out to beta testers in Singapore and Malaysia achieved the banks goal.

However, for the primary features seen on other mobile banking applications, the bank developed Breeze so these were enhanced. In addition, Breeze provides bank customers with new features, one in particular called eCheques, which is the worlds only electronic check processing system. Along with these features, Breeze has something unexpected in the form of functional but also fun features.

Some of the standard features that have been made more robust on Breeze include things like viewing account balances and transferring funds. Along with the new eCheques feature, Standard Chartered Bank also incorporated an ATM finder, which makes it possible for people to find the closest ATM anywhere needed in a matter of minutes. Instead of making unnecessary phone calls or driving around aimlessly, the information can be pulled up using Breeze with no effort at all. Standard Chartered Bank will also be introducing new features as time goes by to meet growing customer demand.

The entire online and mobile banking application enhances the customers banking and financial experience but the designers and developers added a few fun features just because they were just that fun. When people look at the enhanced conventional features, the revolutionary features, the future features, and the fun features, it is clear that Breeze is unlike any other mobile banking application ever created.

One of the fun features is the background of the iPhone when Breeze is downloaded. During the day, the background is bright, sunny skies that represent daytime but then at night, the background changes to a dark sky filled with shiny stars. Although the application is not necessarily something that adds value, it is fun.

Another fun feature of the Breeze application is the ability for users to personalize their accounts by using different icons, colors, and even avatars. Some people appreciate the ability to add a little personality into the way their account appears while others are not as concerned but either way, this feature is fun. Then one of the most interesting features is moving money by shaking the iPhone. Standard Chartered Bank wanted customers to enjoy the experience with Breeze while also having a mobile banking solution that would save time and effort when managing accounts.