Well-established sites connect through PayPal, as a medium for selling products to certain individuals. These websites don’t even have money-transferring system embedded in their website. They just rely on PayPal for e-commerce. A large number of small tech companies and freelancers rely on PayPal for their daily bread to come through.

One fine morning, sometime last week, all PayPal payments to India were suspended. There seemed to be lack of clarity on why it has happened exactly. Apparently RBI has suspended these payments after several warnings to PayPal. The issue seems to be:

1. PayPal is being used for transferring personal funds, (P2P) without having adequate permissions.
2. Some sources have suggested that PayPal is being used to hide income under personal income and is not coming under the tax net
3. Looks like RBI was OK with the B2B (business to business) transfers but wants to put a stop to the P2P (peer to peer) transfers.

(any clarifications from our banker friends is welcome)

After a few days of anxiety and a lot of buzzing between the PayPal account holders, the?PayPal blog made a statement that they needs to put in place certain changes to comply with Indian regulations.This means that

Indian PayPal users (Business, Premier and Personal Account Holders) are no longer able to receive ?personal payments. Your customers now have three options to pay you by

• Using the Pay for Purchases (Goods or Services) tab
• Completing PayPal checkout at your website
• Responding to PayPal Request Money instructions (invoices)
• When you instruct PayPal to withdraw your PayPal balance to your bank account in India, you will be required to provide a purpose code for the transaction.

The purpose code helps your bank furnish information that may be required by the Reserve Bank of India to identify the nature of the cross border transaction.

There are several other payment sites which are functioning in India including Xoom, Obopay, Moneybookers etc. One wonders if they will come under RBI’s preview too.

JP Morgan’s excellent research report traces PayPal’s growth and prospects. It says the success of PayPal lies in

The website is quite unlike what you may have seen of any banks or financial services.

The focus of website is NOT on the different verticals the company offers i.e. banking, mutual funds, life insurance etc. Instead the landing page focuses on what are the needs of the customer that they need to address. The website is all about the customer. As a customer, why have you visited the website – is it to pay your insurance premium online or maybe to trade in securities.

Website also has an area for feedback which leads to webmonkey survey. The survey is looking for feedback on the website design solely not the products on offer.

Along with the group website, the bank website has also taken a new look. The other websites i.e. mutual funds, securities and life insurance have remained the same.

Kotak has an image a bank who adopts better technology. It has been using twitter for Kotak Cards for some time now, but when I visited their facebook page, I found it sadly inadequate. There is no active participation by the bank – the page has only 12 member (bank employees???). The information is minimal.

What do you think about the website – does it appeal? Anything else you would like to see there?

Their recently launched campaign is spread across television, print, outdoor and internet.

Most Life Insurance ads have always shown parents thinking about their children and making it big. Most or rather all ads with the exception of LIC have the visualization of a child growing up and becoming a Engineer, Doctor, Cricketer, Pilot, etc

The companies who have adapted the typical route include ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, HDFC Standard Life Insurance, Aviva Life Insurance and the latest company to jump onto this bandwagon is Aegon Religare Life Insurance.

While this concept might have worked well a few years ago with time parents do seem to understand that there is a Career beyond the typical few and if we look at these ads realistically they all talk the same language.

The Kotak Life Insurance ad stands out and in a witty manner tells parents that how can they decide well in advance what their child would want to be. Also the ad highlights the core benefit which is creating a corpus for the child’s higher education and putting this corpus to use on the career of the child’s choice and not the parents.

The campaign has a simple thought ‘Chotu kya Banega’ and they have a microsite specifically put up for this campaign http://www.chotukyabanega.com/index.php

The site also has a contest where a user can nominate a child who has potential but is unable to fulfill his /her dream due to financial constrains. The Winner of this contest shall have 1 Lakh rupees being paid to the child whose story was shared.

We, at Cashcow.in believe its a clutter-breaking campaign, which brings a reality check on the role insurance or money can play. It can only be an enabler, and not a magic wand. But then, hasn’t advertising always fed on dreams, aspirations and fantasies?

The site now bears a fresh look and is condensed enough in resolution to appear in a single screen frame with no scroll needed; atleast on the homepage.

The main banners have a tag above the logo of ICICI Bank Internet Banking ‘Jiyo Online’. This clearly proves that the site is no longer just to give information but to transact and experience the convenience, and underlines ICICI Bank’s thrust at increasing usage.

A few observations about the site :

1. The left navigation is predominantly a Login driven section
2. The top navigation and menu is product and category specific
3. The personal banking piece is naturally top priority considering the scale and thus occupies the first slot within all offerings
4. A lot of focus on online has come as the areas highlighted upfront are online applications, view and paying online and online general insurance model; this would also allow ICICI Lombard General Insurance to gain huge mileage
5. Keeping their stance on safe banking intact there is a special section called – Stay Protected. The link goes into an entire micro-site dedicated to safe banking that covers an overview, measures, steps to be taken, frauds and how to identify them, etc
6. There is a complaints and compliments section. The opinion poll on the site too asks people about how they find the new look of the site
7. There is a section on the homepage called ‘Most Popular’ this section plays 2 roles; it informs a user on what’s been searched / accessed the most and would also boost search rankings for the site
8. A special offer zone on the homepage tends to attract traffic towards the latest offerings and special promotions

On dwelling deeper we discover that not all internal pages have as fresh a look as the homepage.

The tweaking is only restricted to the top frame navigation and the left navigation. The display of content is neat and well formatted however some pages are way too lengthy to scroll through to get to the bottom.

I was looking out for a search option since the site is new and am sure most users would need to find their favourite sections through a search box but I was unable to search the search box. An important rule on any new site is to either have a strong search functionality highlighted upfront or a link to view the old site for those who are not very comfortable yet.

Too much focus across the site on online – Be it buy or transact or bill pay could work both ways; either it could increase transactions and thereby boost revenue or not help – If it does not help to increase transactions then valuable inventory that could be used to promote other offerings is lost.

Within the internal pages I was unable to locate banner space either on left navigation or right navigation to promote other offerings – Cross linking / promotion could have been done better.

Do check the site yourself. Go to www.icicibank.com and tell us what YOU think.

The reason for writing abot the Max New York Life’s effort is that they do seem to be taking it a long way. Besides having a seperate microsite for it (bad graphics here), they have a rather informative blog running too.

There are some parenting articles on the site too. The press release also promises a toll free parents helpline for guidance on any child related issues. One wonders how will they make it a sustainable helpline…will Child Psychiatrist answer the queries? If this was the US I would say it has the potential for disaster with wrong advise making the company liable to being sued. They have also created a Youtube channel which has a testimonial like video loaded onto it.

All in all a good effort to leverage the scholarship but it could have been slicker.

What we particularly liked about this  site design was that knowledge based article were backed by great tools and product information. There a smooth integration of all aspects without it looking like a hard sell marketing effort. I believe the main reason for his initiative becoming comment-worthy is that it adds real value to the customer with a good amount of useful content here, not just the run-of-the-mill stuff.

Consumer education programs also make sense from the viewpoint of banks. Informed customers are often happier customers—and happy customers are more likely to build a solid relationship with the bank. In the end, consumer education can lead to enhanced profits for the bank.

Also a great student education initiative

The bank has also placed great emphasis on financial education for students. Here is microsite loaded with videos about various aspects of financial education called MBC (a take off on NBC?) run by Bank of America. There is geeky central charter called Morris who is set about walking around the campus with the 10 commandments-like book called the Morris code which has the basics of finance

Have a look here at this flash site

Taglines are the first step and an integral part of brand building. Their value builds for years, and over time, a good tagline can be your best and least expensive form of advertising. If your company name, logo and tagline are all working together as they should, they become an ad in and of themselves.

As Jay Ehret of the marketing spotblog says

Good taglines perform three important functions for your brand:

• They cut through marketing clutter and communicate your brand promise in a sticky, memorable way.
• They are an accountability tool in that they remind you of your own brand promise.
• They are the customers’ indicator of a future experience.

We have made a list of taglines used by Indian banks. Surprisingly enough, many of the new Indian private sector banks do not use any tag line. Have a look

Nationalised Banks

Older Private sector banks

New Private Sector Banks

Some international banks

SEBI has tied up with certain banks which are called Self Certified Syndicate banks (SCSB). These banks can give the ASBA facility to applicants. The applicant can submit the ASBA application to the SCSB with whom he/she has an account. The money equivalent to the potential investment would be blocked. When the units are allotted to the investor, an amount equivalent to the shares allotted is only deducted and the block is removed for the remaining amount. Till then the entire application money is sitting in the bank account earning interest which is not the case in the normal route of applying for an IPO wherein the entire application money goes to the company.

As you can see ASBA obviously is quite advantageous, but how successful has ASBA been?
Apparently it is not very successful. There are many reasons for the same – No publicity about this new investment opportunity especially in the smaller cities and towns. Forms are not readily available with the banks. Banks do not get as much commission as the brokers get due to which they are not interested in promoting it. Many investors are shy of investing through this route as it is not clear about whom to approach if there are mistakes in allotment.

Check out these figures – The Mahindra Holidays IPO had only 0.49% of bids (retail investment) via ASBA. Issues like Adani Power had less than 2% of applications via ASBA. Only 0.13% applications for the IPO of Indiabulls Power were made via the ASBA process.

I feel it is a good facility that will increase the number of applications tremendously and increase the potential investor base. But the public has to be informed about the facility properly and the banks should be given enough incentive to promote the use of ASBA.

To start with you have to answer a couple of questions like these below…

And you can choose a design ..some cool ones here If you are a cat lover this is the one for you

and if you are into big city and bright light here is one for you

The card applicant also gets a choice of 4 rewards programs. Based on the credit information you volunteer and your choice of reward, the terms and conditions vary in a narrow range.

The whole thing is very gimmicky. Surely you can get such variations by choosing a different card. For instance if you are looking for better cash back rewards, there are credit cards which offer just that.

There seem to be no real benefit offered by these DIY cards. I would like to see a card where you can set your spending limits and sub-limits. What else would you like to see in your credit card?

The interview is a bit long but well worth the read ….. Also don’t forget to have a look at the video at the end of the post.

Cash Cow: How is NCR working in financial services to enhance that banking experience? Have any of your more innovative solutions been already introduced in India? Any experiences to share?

Mr Rao: We are committed to introduce next generation self-service solutions in the Indian market and a case-in-point being the recent introduction of NCR SelfServ 32 ATM – the country’s first multi-function bunch cheque (up to 30 cheques) and cash (up to 300 notes) deposits solution scalable to offer Bill Payment as well. NCR SelfServ units are available with NCR’s patented two-sided thermal (2ST) receipt printers that can reduce ATM receipt paper consumption by up to 45 percent. NCR Corporation, has sold its 50,000th NCR SelfServ ATM, globally, helping hundreds of financial institutions deliver improved service to consumers at the ATM channel through improved availability and increased transaction options.

The other multi-channel self-service banking solutions recently introduced included NCR APTRATM eMarketing and APTRA Connections software that allow banks to better serve their customers across point of service, mobile and online channels.

The recent introduction of a functioning cheque truncation system and automated note deposit has paved the way for widespread automated cheque and bulk deposit to be introduced at India’s ATMs. In the fourth quarter of last year, NCR recorded the country’s highest ever single day volume of image-based cheque clearing for RBI.

Cashcow: What have been your unique experiences with the Indian customers? Have you developed any differentiated products and Services for the Indian marketplace?

Mr Rao: Indian consumers are one of the leaders amongst world consumers, when it comes to demand for more self-service technology. According to the latest consumer research undertaken by Buzzback sponsored by NCR – 97 percent of Indian consumers are likely to do business with companies that offer self-service solutions.

It is estimated that 560 million people in India (about 51 per cent of the population) are financially underserved or have no access to any formal source of banking or financial services according to a NCR white paper on Financial Inclusion titled – ‘Bringing Financial Services to the Masses’, written by Frost & Sullivan. Depositing money or seeking credit then, for these low income wagers is a major challenge. They are exploited by money lenders who charge an obscene interest rate.

Illiteracy, lack of interest and distance from the branch are also barriers for these low income wagers when it comes to depositing their hard earned money.

To address this, NCR along FINO launched the FINO & NCR EasyPoint™ 70 Tijori – a micro deposit solution designed and developed to encourage deposits and savings by low income wage earners.

The FINO & NCR EasyPoint 70 Tijori has the looks of an ATM, however it not only allows cash withdrawals but also scalable to allow multiple financial services, such as savings, deposits, remittance, payment of micro-insurance premiums and utility bills. Transaction details are recorded in the device and on the user’s smart card. The scalability of the machine allows transaction data to be transferred to the bank’s system via online connection. It can operate both online and offline, overcoming connectivity issues normally encountered in rural India.

The recording of transactional data enables low-wage earners to create a credit profile to access micro credit, further enabling them to seek aid from banks and Micro-Finance Institutions (MFIs) to assist their business. The idea is to bring these masses under financial inclusion to promote savings using technology and solutions.

A biometric reader scans the fingerprint of the customer as an authentication code for each transaction, allowing illiterate and semi-literate populations to transact with ease and ensure a second level of authentication. The use of the micro-deposit machine is made easy with instructions relayed in both video and audio (voice) formats. Voice instructions can be delivered in 14 regional languages.

The customer receives a printed receipt for every transaction performed, providing valid proof of deposits and withdrawals. This provides increased confidence for those using the device.

A successful Pilot of the FINO & NCR EasyPoint 70 Tijori was conducted in Dharavi, Mumbai.

Cashcow: ICICI has hived off its ATM services, do you see this as a possible Industry trend. How will it impact the consumer?

Mr Rao: In today’s highly competitive climate, leading financial institutions and ATM deployers are striving to enhance their customer experience, optimize operational costs, increase channel availability, generate more revenue and improve the overall efficiency of their self-service channel.

Running a large ATM network is complex and involves teams and disciplines to ensure the integration of hardware, software and processing. A growing number of institutions look to NCR’s expertise to manage their complete end-to-end channel services, which involves everything from site selection to cash replenishment, as well as significant uptime demands.

For the consumer this would translate to high availability of their trusted channel on 24/7 basis which would translate to greater loyalty.

Cashcow: What are the innovations that we can see in the coming years in the financial services that will impact the customer?

Mr Rao: We continue to see the following ATM trends:

ATM Management Outsourcing: (Available in India now)

A growing number of institutions look to NCR’s expertise to manage the complete end-to-end channel service, which involves everything from site selection to cash replenishment, as well as significant uptime demands. We feel that more banks in India will continue to invest in outsourcing the management of their ATM channel for enhanced service and higher availability. The outsourcing of the ATM channel to experts like NCR allows banks to focus more on their core businesses and ensure high availability of their ATM channel at all times.

Intelligent Deposits (Available in India now)

Intelligent deposit ATMs, which enable consumers to deposit cheques and cash in bulk without the use of an envelope, are in particular demand. Intelligent deposit ATMs, which enable consumers to deposit cheques and cash in bulk without the use of an envelope, are in particular demand.

This is a huge improvement over envelope deposits where consumers were always nervous about the deposit hitting their account. The ATM receipts give them more detail than they would it they made the deposit via a teller. Deposits are one of the high frequency, time consuming activities that tellers have to undertake, which diverts attention away from more important sales and service activities.

RBR predicts global deposit ATM volumes to rise at a compound annual rate of up to 34%, giving a global unit market size of up to 600,000 deposit units up until 2018.

Multi Channel approach (Available in India now)

Another key opportunity we see is to view the ATM as part of a holistic multi-channel delivery strategy that incorporates mobile, online and branch banking. We constantly innovate to ensure that our solutions are meeting all future customer requirements and are in line to address the challenges being faced by the industry. Our goal is to help companies transform their customer experience and optimise operational efficiency, for a true competitive advantage.

This takes much more than technology; it takes a holistic approach that includes primary research, analysis, strategy and big-picture thinking. It is not about how fast you change models it is more to do with self-service solutions that are meeting the future needs of consumers and customers.

Multi Function ATM’s (Available in India now)

Consumers generally use ATMs for six standard transactions: withdrawal, deposit, account transfer, balance inquiry, mobile phone top-up and, on occasion, statement printing, in the UK and US. In other countries, ATMs are used as a true self-service fulfilment channel which helps banks reduce operational costs, provide better customer service and increase loyalty.

Beyond the traditional six transactions, we see ATMs being used for:

• Bill payments (for everything from utilities bills to speeding fines);
• The provision of social security funds;
• Remittances by migrant workers;
• Share subscriptions;
• Buying tickets or picking up tickets bought over the web;
• Mobile, contactless card and phone card top-ups;
• Airline ticket sales;
• Target advertising, competitions and data cleansing; and
• Charitable fundraising.

MOBILE AND CONTACTLESS CARD TOP-UPS

In the UK, 54% of the population has Pay As You Go (PAYG) mobiles and this is likely to increase to 65% in 2009 according to a recent Post Office survey. Last year, around 1.6 million mobile phone top-ups were carried out on UK ATMs, according to APACS – the UK payments trade association, and this is likely to grow. It’s a similar story elsewhere in the world. In the future, ATMs will also be used as a contactless card top-up point.

REMITTANCES

The World Bank estimates some US$250bn (£125bn) of remittances are sent worldwide (in 2007 when the latest figure was made available). Migration figures suggest this is going to grow. Consumers need a secure, trustworthy, convenient and cost-effective means of moving money overseas and the ATM channel can provide that.

TICKETS

In India, IBDI Bank in India tied up with Indian Airlines in 2005 to provide a service for checking the availability of domestic air tickets and booking a preferred fare through its ATMs. The transaction slip generated by the ATM can be exchanged for a boarding pass at the airport upon proof of identification. In Spain it’s possible to buy movie, concert or theatre tickets or collect tickets bought over the internet. This is particularly useful if you’re using the mobile internet and therefore don’t have a printer. Postage stamps can also be sold via Wells Fargo ATMs in the US.

GOVERNMENT PAYMENTS

In Vietnam, Vietinbank bank is piloting a scheme to enable income tax, VAT, special consumption tax and personal income tax to be paid via ATMs to reduce queuing in government offices. In Spain, Caja Madrid, is enabling customers to pay local government taxes and access social security funds by inserting their Spanish Electronic National Identity Card (eDNI) into an NCR SelfServ ATM. Consumers can even renew their driver’s license at the ATM in Singapore.

STOCKS AND SHARES

Stocks and bonds have been sold exclusively on ATMs in Singapore since the mid-1990s. For example, in the summer of last year OCBC made a $1 billion offer of high dividend, bond-like instruments via NCR ATMs. The biggest IPO in the history of the Singapore Stock Exchange was made by Singtel via OCBC ATMs in 1993.

CHARITY FUNDRAISING

Banks need to restore trust with consumers. One way they can do this is to promote the work they do to support charities to a greater degree. For example, many banks make it possible for consumers to donate quickly and easily via their ATMs or for the bank itself makes a contribution to a charity for every customer transaction at the ATM.

Unlike donating money via a collection bucket, consumers in the UK are given the opportunity to immediately Gift Aid any donation they make, a scheme which allows charities to reclaim 28p of tax for every £1 donated. Some NCR customers, such as the National Bank of Abu Dhabi are using ATMs for social purposes, for example promoting a call for blood donations (Customer examples: Wells Fargo in the US, ICICI Bank, HSBC in the UK, and Tesco Personal Finance in the UK).

NFC/CONTACTLESS TECHNOLOGIES

NFC/Contactless technology is already available on NCR ATMs. In Singapore, NFC-enabled ATMs are being used to top-up pre-paid transit cards. In Malaysia, similar ATMs are used to recharge Touch n’Go cards for Highway toll & retail purchase. Transit has been the biggest driver of Contactless & NCF and we foresee this trend in Thailand as well. The introduction of new technologies on the ATM channel will be a combination of feature/functionality & existing channel trust. The ATM will be – in the foreseeable future – an enhanced touch point, a customer interaction portal, providing value added services beyond cash & dash.

Cashless society: Data has shown that new channels or modes of banking increase the actual number of transactions. Cash is, and will be king for many more years to come.

According the to the Global ATM Market & Forecasts 2013 report published by Retail Banking Research (RBR) compared to other developing countries in Asia the penetration of ATM’s is pretty low for e.g. in 2007

• Thailand had27578 ATMs with 415 ATMs per million
• India had 34765 ATMs with 31 ATMs per million
• China had 130000 ATMs with 98 ATMs per million
• Singapore had 1906 ATMs with 419 ATMs per million
• Philippine had 7513 ATMs with 82 ATMs per million

The RBR ATM Report forecasts that by 2013 the number of installations in India would have reached 1, 00,000 an increase of almost 200% on the figure of 2007 which was at 34,765 ATMs

Cashcow: How can banks use technology as a differentiator to attract and retain customers?

Mr. Rao: As mentioned earlier, 97 percent of Indian consumers are likely to do business with companies that offer self-service solutions. Moreover the Buzzback study also shows that 94% Indian consumers were more likely to use the services of a financial institution which gives you the flexibility to manage your money easily via online, mobile and kiosk self-service channels versus an institution that doesn’t.

The findings confirm that self-service is a global phenomenon being driven by consumers who are looking for greater speed, convenience and flexibility in managing their interactions with companies. The urban consumers who are pressed for time have very limited choice for self-service solutions and are keen to adopt such technology when offered, and a good example of it is the ATM revolution. It’s clear that in India, more than anywhere else in the world, consumers favour companies that allow them to do business where and when they wish. Self-service is smart capital expenditure for companies, especially in the current environment by enabling routine transactions to be carried out cost effectively while freeing up staff to improve service and revenue.

In the recent past, banks have continued to invest in technology that is able to deliver front line, customer facing technologies that improve the consumer experience and increase loyalty. This technology also enables operational efficiencies and improvements in customer service. We believe that there will continue to be a case for our banking solutions as financial institutions seek to improve productivity and at the same time deliver better customer interaction and profitability.