Karachi: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Wednesday (September 15) announced that a ‘Customer’s Digital Onboarding Framework’ was formulated to facilitate people and banks to remotely and conveniently open bank accounts through digital channels, according to news sources.
The central bank disclosed that the account opening process has been made easy while making sure it is in accordance with international standards and regulatory requirements. It was mentioned that the framework will provide a simplified way for everyone – especially unemployed women, self-employed, and freelancers – to open bank accounts with minimum documentation requirements.
Additionally, the said initiative will include the excluded segment of the society in the formal banking sector; help in achieving the financial inclusion aim of SBP it will promote equality as it will bring women into the financial system. This initiative will increase convenience for the customers as they will be able to use secure digital financial infrastructure for financial needs.
It was reported that the framework was devised after a comprehensive consultation with the stakeholders and industry experts to address the problems that banks might face in the implementation of the framework.
Moreover, it was disclosed that the accounts can be opened in four categories, depending on the functional limits such as fund transfer limits, deposit, or withdrawal limits. The categories include:
Digital Account
Asaan Digital Remittance Account
Freelancer Digital Account
Asaan Digital Account
Opening a bank account under Asaan Digital Account is the easiest as basic information and a minimum number of documents will be required. Although, there will be some functionality restrictions. On the other hand, Digital Account will require a lot more information to open a bank account, but has no functional limitation.
Giving out more details, it was mentioned that you can start with a basic account and upgrade to any account you like. The SBP has ordered the banks to not take more than two working days to approve or reject opening the accounts after all the requirements are fulfilled. Also, the central bank has directed the banks to have 24/7 active customer support service.
Besides this, the banks must provide a tracking number to the applicants to follow up on the status updates. SBP has ordered the banking sector to implement this framework by December 31, 2021.
Iqra holds BS in International Relations and is passionate about writing engaging content on trending real estate topics. When not working, she is either spending time with family, shopping, or discussing shows & movies.
