Financial services and your identity

One of the most important parts of a banks and financial services remit is to protect your money and investments at all times. As a result they have to be very careful when dealing with members of the public who ring them up asking to make enquiries to to make changes to a product or service they have. In the past the branch system was in a much better position to deal with this type of situation. People were regular customers and would be known and recognised. However with the advent of digital platforms and telephone banking the need for branches has seriously declined. Whilst it is much more convenient to bank at any time of the day or night, identifying who you say you are for the bank is much harder.

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This is why they all invest in very robust KNOW YOUR CUSTOMER systems to ensure that whoever they talk to is actually the account holder. This can be seen as a great annoyance to customers but it makes perfect sense. Any breach of security must be properly reported to the correct authorities and if the bank or financial services provided is found to be negligent in its duty then it can be heavily fined or have its licence to operate revoked.

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The convenience of the digital comes at a price for us and it means knowing passwords and usernames and the bank keeping up to date records that are secured. Consider this, it might be easier than having to get on a bus, drive into town, get parked, make your way through the weather just to make a bill payment as you would have done in the past.