Although ensuring regulatory compliance is a challenging task in its own right, financial institutions (FIs) and other embedded service providers must clear yet another hurdle – providing their customers with a seamless experience. What complicates matters further is the fact that “seamlessness” isn’t exactly a one-size-fits-all proposition. For some customers, it means having access to an easy-to-use online interface and quick provision of services. For others, though, it means having one’s mind at rest in regard to security.
As Viktorija Mažūnė, Customer Experience Director at ConnectPay, told us, most businesses would benefit from putting security first and then gradually raising the bar on convenience:
“This is very important. Not only because financial institutions must satisfy very high regulatory standards, but also because of the rise in cybercrime. You don’t want clients coming to you with complaints about questionable security they’ve been hearing from their own customers. And while it is true that putting security first typically involves making compromises with regards to convenience, there are steps you can take to find a good balance”.
One of these is your overall attitude towards customers, especially when it comes to onboarding. For smaller businesses that don’t have a team of professionals dedicated exclusively to paperwork, obtaining and submitting documents, which might have been lost or misplaced in the meanwhile, can be a real pain. To motivate them, you should emphasise why they would benefit from this, rather than give them a dry explanation of the requirements your own company is bound to meet as a financial institution.
“Customers aren’t terribly interested in what you need. What they want from embedded finance is the same thing they want from a car – they want it to work and to have access to quality support if and when something goes wrong. But no car owner is ever going to say “I want to do paperwork, even when it’s not strictly required”. However, if you explain to customers how this will benefit them – and save them a headache in the future – they usually agree to do what you’re asking of them – and enthusiastically so. Is this part of convenience? I think so,” Viktorija explained.
Security and convenience, furthermore, can often be successfully balanced by choosing the optimal way of implementing compliance. All are subject to the same laws and regulations, but as long as the basic conditions are met, businesses are given considerable latitude in how they arrive at full compliance.
“Having a user-friendly, well-integrated, and graphically attractive interface certainly helps with getting customers to submit the required information. But your options don’t just end there. For instance, if you’re working with large businesses that generate huge revenues, you should probably stick to onboarding them right away. On the other hand, if your client base mostly consists of smaller companies, you can ask relatively few of the mandatory questions first, and dole out the rest later, one by one, as your relationship develops”.
In summing up, Viktorija also pointed out that while the quantity of the measures needed to maximise security is currently more or less fixed, their experiential quality can be significantly modified. “It’s like this. Prioritising security does involve putting several, let’s be honest, somewhat inconvenient measures in place. So there’s that. All the same, you can file off their sharper edges and distribute them differently, thereby achieving an excellent result”.
