The age of open banking is upon us, and the author of the article does well to remind readers that it is all about the customer in this era. Customer-centrism is no longer an idea to play lip service to, it is a guiding principle that shapes how services are conceived and delivered. Technology has place the tools in the hands of the FIs, and many consumers are daily more aware of how these capabilities are putting them at the hub for retail businesses, and curious why they are not seeing similar developments from FIs. How this varies across various economies is called out.
In the Nordics, like in Australia, open API’s have been used for at least 3 years so that’s not news but what is news is that the Nordics and Au[s]tralia have been very proactive of explaining and interacting with consumers on open banking from day one either by sending out communication, holding town halls or other forms of media but always ensuring that people were informed. I am in no way trying to take a shot at the U.K. but I would like to instead raise awareness of what open banking, followed by PSD2 and GDPR will mean to the client. While the UK banking and fintech world has a better understanding of what this all means (ok, this may be debatable) we are no closer in informing and convincing the mass, the real relevant party and reason why we embarked on this, the customer.
Mercator Advisory Group recognizes the varying degrees and pace of movement different economies are incorporating the precepts of open banking in their own financial systems. There also exists a wide in levels of participation from individual institutions that see fit to engage in that same effort. What is no longer debatable is that there is a sea change underway in how banking activities are being performed, and who will be facilitating them on behalf of consumers.
Overview by Joseph Walent, Associate Director, Customer Interactions Advisory Service at Mercator Advisory Group
Read the quoted story here