For busy individuals and corporate teams, having to take a trip down to the bank branch to deposit a check is a time-consuming inconvenience. With paper checks, individuals and corporate customers have been clamoring for another way to deal with them. Checks are still commonly used with corporations that don’t rely as much on online banking and deal with other companies that feel the same way.
Thankfully, remote deposit capture has come along to fill the void and make dealing with checks far more convenient.
Digital Check Scanning
With so many people armed with a smartphone that has a high-definition camera lens, taking HD shots of a check is easy. Rather than waiting for the physical check to be presented, cooperating banks seeking speed and greater efficiency can get the ball rolling before receiving the check through depositing or a lock box.
For customers, it’s faster than batching up checks for the week to avoid their clerk having to go to the bank daily and deal with the queues. Checks can begin the depositing process sooner and without delay.
Cost Savings
Remote deposit capture via digital check scanning services is expected to save banks $1.2m for every 100,000 checks routed through a forward-clearing system. That’s approximately $12 per check.
In an age where corporations and individuals face high management account fees monthly, anything that lowers bank expenses is likely to lead to higher service levels. Certainly, the easier deposit and faster clearing process is a winner with customers and tends to keep them satisfied that their bank is innovating sufficiently to retain their business.
Studies Show Remote Deposit Capture is Desirable
Recent studies have shown that customers approve of remote deposit capture facilities. Given that as a population, smartphones are readily embraced and the use of scan-able QR codes has become second nature, it makes perfect sense to let the smartphone smooth out any bottlenecks in personal and business banking too. For banks, using newer technology like this improves their workflow too.
Security Protections
Security is crucially important with banking. With remote deposits, the geo-location features in a smartphone’s GPS allows for confirmation of the location where the deposit was electronically sent from. For instance, should the location change from the corporate office to a secondary one, this will potentially raise a red flag on the deposit. Monitoring of the process for risk factors is done in accordance with FFIEC guidelines to rule out problems with bad actors.
When a financial institution fails to innovate, eventually they’ll get overtaken in the marketplace, especially in the age of FinTech firms continually shaking up the industry. The need for banks to use new and interesting technologies to upgrade their services is apparent. Customers want improved ways to move money around and deposit checks without losing time doing so. A bank’s ability to move with the times will help it to retain a modern brand reputation. Customers provide positive word of mouth with friends, or colleagues in the business world when their needs are met.
