PSBs catch up in online transactions
The public sector banks (PSBs) are increasingly becoming tech savvy to catch up with their private sector counterparts which is evident from the rising transaction by the customers in alternate channels.
For the country’s largest bank, State Bank of India (SBI), transactions through alternate channels have gone up to 28-30% as against 22% recorded in the beginning of 2009-10. A Krishna Kumar, deputy managing director of SBI, said, “Though the bank had projected a target of 40% of transaction through alternate channels by the end of financial year, it doesn’t seem to be possible. Hence, we are looking at reaching at least 30% by March,” said Kumar while clarifying that number of persons visiting bank’s branches has not led to a fall of customers at the branch.
“We are having huge addition of customers. On a monthly basis, we are adding nearly 25 to 30 lakh new customers. Still, I do hope that the alternate channels will help ease the rush of customers at bank branches,” he said. SBI has 24-25 crore of accounts and 14-15 crore customer base.
Punjab National Bank (PNB) has 6 crore customer base and according to Mohan Tanksale, executive director of PNB, 25% of the bank’s customers are transacting through alternate channels. He said the number is likely to go up to 30% by March-end. “When physical transactions are migrated to alternate channels, it helps us in a big way. We can use the front-end staff of the bank branches for cross-selling of our products,” he said.
M Narendra, CMD of Indian Overseas Bank (IOB), said alternate channels comprises 15% of the bank’s entire transactions.
“On an average, 300 transactions take place through mobile banking in my bank as of now. Through alternate channels, we want to change the demographic profile of our customers to 25-26 years, from existing 45-46 years. Though relevance of branch banking would not die down by the introduction of the alternate channels, it would help banks to save costs through the increasing use of the alternate channels,” Narendra added. BA Prabhakar, ED of Bank of India, said an alternate channel was contributing 20% of the total bank’s transactions.
N Srinath, ED of Bank of Baroda, also said that he expects the rush of customers, visiting Bank of Baroda branches would definitely come down once transactions through alternate channels picks up in a big way.
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