Will bank counters "disappear"?
A question worth thinking about. With the development of financial technology, about 80% of the personal business of banks can be handled through mobile banking APPs or smart counters at branches. With the explosion of generative artificial intelligence technology, will the intelligent transformation of bank counters accelerate in two to three years? Except for special counters such as those for the elderly, will most of the other manual counters disappear?
Brokerage China reporters reviewed the 2023 annual reports of listed banks that have been disclosed and found that digital and intelligent transformation are must-mentioned topics. In terms of offline channels, the transformation of smart equipment at bank branches has been mentioned many times, including "streamlining counter business" "Process", "Enriching intelligent counter functional services" and "Moving branches to light operation" have become the directions pursued by various bank branch operation reforms.
Judging from the statements in the annual reports of listed banks, using digital technology to empower branch operations has always been the pursuit of digital transformation by various banks, and self-service and intelligent equipment at branches are the key carriers of intelligent operation of branches.
Brokerage China reporters found that ICBC has approximately 15,500 banking outlets, currently has 21,000 self-service banks, 76,200 smart devices, and 53,700 ATMs. It is equivalent to each branch having been equipped with several self-service or smart financial machines.
In terms of self-service channel configuration, China Construction Bank will have more than 48,100 self-service teller machines in operation by the end of 2023, and more than 43,400 smart teller machines in operation. It is worth noting that CCB has increased its investment in self-service equipment at county outlets, setting up 15,100 self-service teller machines and 13,100 smart teller machines in counties, and deploying 1,120 self-service equipment in 160 key counties.
For Agricultural Bank of China, the bank’s teller staff accounted for 17.8%. The bank stated that it will continue to promote the construction of a unified platform for intelligent terminals, develop pilot intelligent low cabinet systems, and also reduce inefficiency equipment. As of the end of 2023, Agricultural Bank of China has 54,900 super counters, 53,700 cash self-service devices, and 3,200 self-service terminals.
In addition, the Postal Savings Bank stated that the bank has significantly improved its self-service equipment and mobile exhibition service capabilities, added nearly 200 new financial functions and more than 300 banking business functions; and built a "cloud cabinet" for "online and offline" omni-channel collaboration. The new remote service model has been promoted to more than 6,000 outlets, with a total of about 8,000 ITM, STM and other equipment connected. As of the end of 2023, the bank has a total of 135,000 self-service devices in stock, including 50,600 ITMs, accounting for 96.37% of self-service devices with cashless business functions.
Among joint-stock banks, China Merchants Bank and China CITIC Bank disclosed specific data on terminal equipment at their outlets. Among them, at the end of 2023, China Merchants Bank outlets had 2,226 self-service banks, 5,281 self-service equipment, and 7,603 visual equipment; CITIC Bank had 1,529 self-service banks, 4,482 self-service equipment, and 9,131 smart counters.
Urban and rural commercial banks are also sparing no effort to update self-service equipment. Take the Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank as an example. The bank has appropriately tilted its resources to suburban branches in terms of outlets and staffing. As of the end of 2023, the bank has installed a total of 672 smart teller machines and 82 corporate smart low-end counters in suburban outlets.
"Cloud counter" and "digital teller" coverage expanded
For banks, branch operations have rigid costs in terms of hardware and manpower. The online operations and offline self-service intelligent equipment brought about by digital transformation have brought practical reductions in the use of bank branches to release human labor and improve operational efficiency. This effect.
The "Research on the Development Strategy of Bank Intelligent Transformation Driven by Financial Technology" released by the China Banking Association three years ago shows that in recent years, intelligent self-service equipment at branches, represented by intelligent teller machines, have been rapidly adopted and promoted by commercial banks, and are accompanied by transaction processes. With the electronic and automated transformation process, the manual replacement rate and business departure rate of branch services have gradually increased, and a service model of "customer self-service as the mainstay, employee assistance as the supplement" has initially been formed.
It can be observed that after the development in recent years, the digital transformation of traditional counter business of commercial banks has achieved obvious results. A common scenario is that customers go to branches to handle business. Most procedural businesses can be handled at self-service smart device terminals with the assistance of branch staff. The situation of queuing up to the counter for processing has been greatly reduced.
While offline branches are undergoing intelligent transformation, many banks have opened services such as "cloud counters" and "digital tellers".
1. Ping An Bank deploys virtual digital humans on multiple important platforms such as the bank’s branch equipment and mobile APPs to reduce manual workload. By the end of 2023, virtual digital humans will help approximately 45% of retail operation review workloads achieve automated approval.
2. Postal Savings Bank has about 8,000 self-service devices promoting the application of "cloud cabinet" remote authorization. At the same time, AI digital employees are applied on the "Cloud Cabinet" to provide customers with business consulting, business processing and other services through the progressive and question-and-answer guidance of AI digital employees.
3. Minsheng Bank’s “Enterprise Cloud Counter” promotes “one-stop” online processing of high-frequency corporate business, and the average response time of the blockchain electronic confirmation platform is increased by 78%; through automatic identification of vouchers, business processing is automated, Direct system connection and data sharing significantly replace manual operations.
At the same time, according to the disclosures in the annual reports of listed banks, the transformation of terminal services for aging is also a major aspect. For example, ICBC stated that it will speed up the transformation of smart terminals for aging services, enable elderly customers to automatically switch to large-print interfaces after logging in, and place frequently used functions for elderly customers on the homepage to lower the threshold for elderly customers to use self-service equipment; China Construction Bank said that it will continue to optimize The branches provide elderly-friendly and barrier-free services, and continuously improve service facilities such as sit-down smart teller machines suitable for elderly and disabled customers; the Agricultural Bank of China stated that it has optimized and upgraded the large-character version of its mobile banking to improve the experience of elderly customers.
For banks, because smart counters can simulate human interaction and decision-making processes better and better, smart customer service systems will be more humane, and the development of generative artificial intelligence technology can indeed promote the intelligent transformation of manual counters.
If 80% of traditional counter business has been diverted to online channels, with the development of generative artificial intelligence, can the remaining 20% of high-counter business be almost replaced by smart devices?
"It is expected that with the development of Internet technology, especially the development of AI technology, in the next two years or so, it will be an accelerated trend for bank branches to replace human workers with smart devices." Kelan Software executives recently made their own industry predictions . The company's intelligent high-counter coin counting robot has completed trials in state-owned banks, joint-stock banks and provincial rural credit unions, and is committed to solving the intelligent transformation of offline businesses.
But as to whether high counters will disappear completely, most banking industry insiders say that traditional counters may undergo an intelligent transformation, but some manual windows will still remain.
Regarding the above issues, in the view of Yang Bin, chief information officer of the Bank of Qingdao, tall counters may not disappear completely, but they will gradually be combined with artificial intelligence tellers to provide better services. With the wider application of smart devices and the improvement of smart experiences, it is foreseeable that more smart counters will appear to meet customer needs. At the same time, with the popularity of remote banking services, customers can access banking services remotely through smart devices without going to bank branches in person. This combination will enable customers to enjoy a faster, more efficient and smarter banking service experience, while saving resources and costs for banks.
Regarding development trends, Yang Bin believes that the intelligent transformation of manual counters will be an accelerated trend, but the maturity of the technology is the key. Although generative artificial intelligence technology continues to advance, there are still challenges when it comes to complex decision-making and emotional communication. Time and resources are needed to continuously improve the technology to ensure that smart counters can handle more tasks. Secondly, banking business involves customer privacy and financial security, and smart counters must comply with strict laws and regulations in terms of data processing and customer identity verification. Ensuring the security and credibility of smart counters is an important factor in promoting intelligent transformation.
