Kenya Bankers Association (KBA) is presently working with its members to review best practice in identifying fraud, assessing the impact and escalating the information across the industry while tightening response times.
The industry’s approach to security entails is to constantly raise the bar to ensure all KBA member banks remain protected, in turn safeguarding clients’ data and monies.
This disclosure has been made in the latest edition of the Shared Value Report 2019, a publication by the Kenya Bankers Association (KBA).
This report mentions that banks are leveraging on technology to enhance the user experience of their customers. And that these huge investments in technology-driven products and services has caught the attention of clients.
A survey by KBA reveals shows that customers have a strong confidence investment in IT in the banking sector. For instance, the 6,000 customers survey done between September and November 2018, shows that 90% acknowledged industry efforts.
Top on the list of IT innovations by the banking industry is PesaLink, a digital payment platform that is designed to reduce the cost of transactions and improve bank to bank money transfer. It is estimated that more than Sh 81 billion has been moved through the PesaLink platform to date, since it was launched two years ago.
Other ways that the industry creates value within the National Payments System is the work KBA does in collaboration with the Central Bank of Kenya. KBA successfully completed upgrades to the Automated Clearing House (ACH), a high-tech system used by commercial banks to exchange payment files and facilitate the transfer of value between bank customers and commercial clients.
Faster Transactions for Banks
The upgrade has facilitated inclusion of remitter details on all payment files, enabling banks to immediately identify the payee or remitter of a payment instrument and shortening turnaround times while mitigating disputed transactions and fraud.
Upgrades to the ACH carried out by KBA and CBK in 2018 have also made the processing of foreign currency cheques more seamless. Foreign currency cheques previously cleared on a seven-work day cycle. The turnaround time has now been reduced by five days to T+2 or two days after the cheque is presented in the ACH.
Beyond the ACH, cyber-security and fraud prevention remain at the forefront of the conversation in the midst of rapid technological adoption. As the financial system becomes more digitized in tandem with global trends, there is a need to constantly update security systems to ward off sophisticated fraudsters.
RELATED; How Banks are Keeping up with Technology to Offer Better Services
