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Take a trip to the bank of the future
RFID, digital pens and biometrics all play a part

By Steve Ranger

Published: Tuesday 24 January 2006

As you are walking in to a bank branch office, a member of staff you've never seen before rushes over to greet you by name.

They lead you to the counter where you fill out a paying in slip using a digital pen - the information appears on a screen in front of you and you confirm it is correct.

Standing in the queue to pay in your cheques, you pick up a leaflet on personal loans and start reading. As you pass, a plasma screen on the wall starts showing a video on personal loans, providing more details. You put the leaflet in your pocket.

When you get to the clerk you pay in your cheque, using your fingerprint to prove your identity. He mentions that as a valued customer you can get a special rate on personal loans - if you want to sign up now...

Welcome to the bank of the future.

For all the talk of the internet killing off the high street, around half of a bank's customers will visit the branch at least once a month.

That's three times the number that will visit the website. And so banks are taking another look at how to boost sales through their branch network.

The trick is to use cutting-edge technologies to capture new types of data that can be used to improve the bank's ability to sell to customers, according to Michael Redding, director of research at Accenture's technology labs.

RFID, digital pens and motion-tracking cameras will all be added to the armoury, to help banks find out when their most important customers are visiting and how to sell them more financial products.

Bank cards will be fitted with RFID chips which will allow banks to react faster when important customers visit the branch - for example, by sending someone to meet and greet them as in the example above.

Alternatively, screens in the bank could display a greeting message advertising products that customers might like to buy, based on their profile. If the bank knows Mr Smith has two teenage kids, for example, then when he comes into the branch the screens could advertise student loans.

Accenture's Redding said one bank in Latin America wants to roll out RFID-chipped cards to its VIP clients: "They are trying to make it a status symbol. By making it an object of desire they can get people to elect to take part."

RFID chips can also be embedded in leaflets and these chips could trigger videos on in-house screens to provide further information. The information could be combined with the information from the RFID chip on the customer's card and sent to the counter staff who could then use this to cross-sell.

Digital cameras can also be used to track how individuals move around the bank, helping banks see which layouts work best.

This vision of the branch of the future isn't just sci-fi whimsy, Redding said: "Everything we've shown today is being used somewhere by a bank. All these things are happening in a piecemeal fashion."

Different technologies are being tested by banks to see which fit best, he said: "You don't have to do things on a massive scale until you have validated the economics."

And while some people might be concerned carrying around so many RFID chips he is confident they will be accepted: "It's not a question of will people do it it's a case of how many ones will they carry."

Many customers will see such technologies as bringing advantages - trading off some of their privacy in return for shorter queues or better services, he said: "It's about letting the customer choose. Forcing the customer is not a good story because people won't accept it."

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