Jane Dove: “Can you transfer $250 to Mark Smith?”
With this simple voice command, Mark’s bank account gets credited with money.
If you are surprised, here’s a warm welcome to the world of voice assistant technology in banking.
The simple reason why voice tech is changing the business world is that it is simple to use, and highly efficient. It is expected that by 2024 (Source:Statistica) the number of digital voice assistants in the world will be 8.4 billions- that’s more than the world’s population!
The financial sector has embraced the voice assistant technology with arms-wide-open as it rife with use cases, from biometric authentication to voice driven transactions. Voice provides a much faster way to complete tasks and is a huge help in customer support, account management, user authentication, and more.
If you think voice-assistant technology is new to the financial scene, you are mistaken. Bank of America’s (BofA) voice-assistant software named Erika has answered more than 250 million questions since its launch in 2018. From getting notified about duplicate charges to receiving bill reminders for scheduled payments, it does a lot.
There are many more financial institutions which either have their own voice bots or leverage the technology to consumer applications. But, there is a breadth of financial applications that remain untapped by Voice Technology that can immensely benefit from the ease and convenience of ‘Just Ask Your App’.
In this article, we are going to look at the impact voice assistant technology has created in the financial industry.
Few Challenges in the Financial Industry Resolved by Voice Assistants
- Decrease in customer loyalty thanks to a lot of new players in the market
- Lengthy waiting times to find resolution for any issue
- Laborious customer identification process tests their patience
- Heavy load on call centers who have to respond to even the simplest of queries
Use Cases of Voice Assistant Technology in the Banking industry:
- Voice-Enabled Payments:
Customers can use the bank’s mobile app through voice commands. It is not necessarily a one-way communication, as the voice assistant can also inform the customer about the latest promotions and offers, if any.
With more banks embracing voice-based technologies, the adoption among customers will also grow. Voice payments is immensely popular because of the speed and seamlessness that it offers. Some of the biggest names such as NCR Corporation, Amazon, PayPal, Paysafe, PCI Pal, Vibepay are in the voice-enabled payments space.
You can expect more players entering into the market to make it even more mainstream than it is now. More than 31% of US adults will use voice payments by 2022, says Business Insider.
- Voice-Biometrics Authentication:
Client identification through digital channels can be accomplished in the following ways with voice biometrics:
- Ask for a password or a PIN
- Ask for an OTP or a code
- Follow up questions and responses
Voice biometrics is considered one of the most effective authentication systems as the voice of the customer can not only be used to log them in, but also allow them to go for higher transactions.
The voice of the customer can also be checked against a voice sample. Security is of utmost importance in the finance sector and voice biometrics is highly-effective in restricting a fraud user to gain access to a user’s account details and other critical information. 81% of hacks leverage weak or stolen passwords, voice authentication lowers the chance of fraud.
3. Wealth Management:
Banks can pair voice assistants with its investment portfolio management software. Users can ask questions about their wealth portfolio and how they can optimize their ROI based on their risk capacity. Voice assistants can provide them with a spectrum of financial research with personalized data. This could help the customer immensely in making informed investment decisions.
4. Account Servicing:
Allowing customers to use voice commands to check their account balance, transaction history, account activity, card services, request for cheque book, etc. The voice assistant technology provides a seamless onboarding experience to a new customer with electronic Know Your Customer (eKYC). The context-based query resolution capability of the voice technology provides a superior customer experience.
5. Loan Disbursal:
A voice assistant can even help determine the customer’s eligibility for a loan, enable a smooth disbursal, and even keep track of the EMIs- this fastracks the otherwise slow process that can be frustrating for the customers. The customer can also get information about the different loan schemes available.
One of the most interesting use cases of voice assistant tech in the financial industry is in the collections department. The collections department has a loathsome reputation, but the voice assistant does a great job as it has the ability to handle such interactions with the right mix of empathy and assertiveness.
In conclusion, Voice Assistant technology has achieved incredible gains in the past few months and its adoption is only going to increase with time.
Will a suite of banking services that you can possibly imagine be brought under the ambit of voice assistant technology? Only time will tell. But, we can certainly be sure that the use cases will increase, and nudge business and consumer interactions to Voice interfaces in the financial world.
If you are looking for a voice-based solution for your fintech application that will work with your app’s existing UI, the Alan Platform is the right solution for you.
The team at Alan AI will be more than happy to assist you. Just email us at sales@alan.app
