Equity Bank has been ranked among the top three Tier 1 banks by a new customer survey conducted by the Kenya Bankers Association. This survey was done based on digital user experience analysis.
The Banking Industry Customer Satisfaction Survey 2020 sampled a total of 13,774 respondents and ranked various banks based on the quality of their Digital Banking offering (Mobile and Internet Banking) as well as overall innovativeness in this realm. The KBA survey targeted customers across all the banks where they filled out a structured questionnaire on services received.
According to the survey, most respondents indicated having had a good experience with Mobile Banking applications, singling out effective aesthetics. 73 per cent of the respondents that mentioned feature characteristics, cited convenience and efficiency as their main features of interest, with ease of usage and friendliness of user interfaces being the other critical factors.
The KBA report has been released at a time when the country is still facing the COVID-19 pandemic, which has ravaged the economy due to business slowdown, curfew and breakdown of the global supply chain.
In its release of the Q3 2020 results, Equity reported that its business model has migrated from being based on fixed cost channels to digital self-service and third-party variable cost channels. The business is transforming from a ‘place you go’ to ‘what you do’ on devices, removing and compressing time and geography thus making its business 24-hours, whatever time, wherever you are. For the first time, the digital bank overtook the legacy bank in both the number of transactions and value of transactions handled on a daily basis. Online banking products and services experienced the greatest growth with digital transaction values growing by 34%. Customer engagement increased as reflected by the 45% growth in their deposits for the Q3 2020 period.
Digital banking adoption was heightened by the raft of measures put forward by Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) in consultation with KBA, in facilitating the increased use of mobile money instead of physical cash. CBK also advocated for digital banking as a way of decongesting bank branches to reduce COVID-19 spread while increasing its surveillance against fraud.
Equity’s Fintech Innovation and Digitisation has enabled at least 98% transactions to take place outside the bank with at least 83% taking place in Mobile and Internet Banking platforms.
In addition, 59% of Equity’s transaction value took place outside the branches with Mobile and Internet banking taking a 33% chunk of the total value.
The digitization of the bank’s services has increased efficiency and cost optimization gains ensuring that customers can be able to enjoy their services from the comfort of their homes/workplaces. Under the Eazzy Banking suite, Equity customers conveniently access banking through the mobile App, or online through their computers. Customers with feature phones can still enjoy mobile banking services under Equity’s MVNO, Equitel or by dialing *247# on their mobile phone. Moreover, the limited handling of physical cash has in turn reduced the risk of exposure to the COVID-19 virus for digital banking customers.
