OCBC BANK IS FIRST IN SINGAPORE TO LAUNCH VOICE-POWERED CONVERSATIONAL BANKING

OCBC BANK IS FIRST IN SINGAPORE TO LAUNCH VOICE-POWERED CONVERSATIONAL BANKING

OCBC Bank’s retail customers can now ask Siri
to check their bank balances, credit card overview and make e-payments

OCBC bank customers can now ask Siri to check
their bank balances, credit card overview and make e-payments. Click image for
video press release.

Singapore, 23 February 2018 – “Hey Siri, what’s my bank balance?”

OCBC Bank is the first bank in Singapore to
enable its customers to do their day-to-day banking and make cashless payments
using just their voices. OCBC Bank’s retail banking customers are now able to
check their bank account balances, outstanding credit card balances and
details, as well as make instant e-payments to friends and family – using Siri,
Apple’s virtual assistant.

The e-payments can be made instantly to any
bank account in Singapore, including bank accounts not linked to the PayNow
service. PayNow is a nationwide peer-to-peer funds transfer service that
enables funds transfers using mobile or NRIC numbers. This latest innovation is
in direct response to how customers are increasingly using voice assistants on
their mobile devices. In October last year, OCBC Bank rolled out a similar
service to business banking customers.

Customers using the latest version of the OCBC
Mobile Banking App can check their bank balances and credit card details by
simply saying, “Hey Siri, what’s my balance?”, or “How much money do I have in
my bank account?”, or “What is my credit card spend?”. They can then
authenticate the transaction with their fingerprint or facial recognition.
Similarly, a customer using the most updated version of the OCBC Pay Anyone app
can make a funds transfer by telling Siri whom to send the money to and how
much to send, and then validate the transaction using their fingerprint or
facial recognition.

This voice banking innovation was developed by
OCBC Bank’s in-house mobile developer and E-Business teams. The service is
available to all OCBC Bank customers using iPhone devices running at least the
iOS11 software and the latest versions of the OCBC Mobile Banking and OCBC Pay
Anyone apps. Authentication using facial recognition is only available on
iPhone X devices.

Mr Aditya Gupta, OCBC Bank’s Head of
E-Business Singapore, said: “This is the new digital – conversational, more
natural and faster access to banking! This latest service marks a major
milestone in banking as it brings us one huge leap closer to making natural
language voice-activated banking and payments a reality. This is just a start –
we will continue to embed ourselves in our customers’ everyday lives using
voice-powered AI tools which they will be able to use for more banking
transactions such as bill payments, money management and common servicing
requests in the future!”

OCBC Bank has constantly worked towards making
banking seamless and embedded in our customers’ natural behaviour and
interactions. OCBC Bank was the first bank in Singapore to introduce biometric
authentication to access bank account details with OCBC OneTouch in March 2015,
and OCBC OneLook in November 2017 on the OCBC Mobile Banking app, leveraging
fingerprint and facial recognition technology. OCBC Bank offered customers the
convenience of banking on their wrist, with our mobile banking app for Apple
Watch in March 2016. In November 2016, OCBC Bank enhanced OCBC Pay Anyone by
enabling customers to send money via OCBC Pay Anyone directly within Apple’s
iMessage on iPhones, and via any app on Android devices using the OCBC Keyboard
in August 2017.

OCBC Pay Anyone e-payment amounts have grown
400% in the last year. The number of OCBC Pay Anyone users has increased more
than 150% since early 2017. As Singapore ramps up its Smart Nation ambitions
with e-payments as a key thrust, OCBC Bank has consistently heeded the
government’s call to make payments more integrated, increasingly convenient and
secure by leveraging biometric technology and the latest innovations developed
for mobile devices.

Checking bank balances via Siri

Checking current or savings accounts:

Checking credit card spend:

Step 1: Ask Siri to check account balance or
credit card spend

Step 2: Authenticate the transaction with
fingerprint or facial recognition

Step 3: Tell Siri or click on the account you
want information on

Making a payment via Siri

Step 1: Tell Siri whom you want to make a
payment to, and how much to send

Step 2: Authenticate transaction with
fingerprint or facial recognition

Step 3: Confirm the payment information, and
tell Siri to “send”, or click “send”

This is the latest in a series of digital
innovations that OCBC Bank has introduced to make day-to-day banking and
payments more seamless, fast and accessible for customers.