The banking industry has evolved rapidly in recent years. In particular, the introduction of computers, the internet, and mobile banking have all completely transformed the way customers access banking services.
But technology has also transformed the way banks manage their operations on an internal level. One big change has been the transition from paper-based documents to digital storage, but this change is still ongoing. The fact that banks still need to deal with large quantities of paper documents is unavoidable and is unlikely to change anytime soon, but these documents usually need to be transferred into a digital format.
Banks favor digital documentation for its convenience and security, but the actual process of digitization can be a significant logistical challenge. It’s also very expensive, often requiring dedicated employees to handle many elements of it, and a large proportion of companies still rely on the inefficient manual transfer of data.
In this article, we look at how optical character recognition (OCR) software can improve the efficiency of the digitization process for banks, and how this in turn can reduce workloads and save banks money.
What is OCR for banking?
OCR software is designed to automatically recognize information from paper documents and transfer it to a digital format. For example, it could be used to ‘read’ a paper application form and capture the information in a digital database.
OCR for banking is standard OCR technology applied to the context of banking. This could mean it is used to process checks and invoices, customer onboarding forms, and any other type of document commonly used in a banking setting.
How can AI improve OCR for banking?
OCR is an excellent tool for businesses to improve efficiency, but it does have its limitations. For example, basic OCR software can have relatively high error rates and incompatibility issues with more complex document formats.
However, in recent years, OCR providers have found a way to leverage AI technology to overcome these limitations. AI can essentially enhance the capabilities of more basic OCR platforms, enabling the software to recognize more document formats, process images as well as text, achieve incredibly high accuracy rates, and more.
The advantages of this improved performance are clear, and AI-powered OCR is now considered by many to be the gold standard in digitization technology.
How can OCR reduce workloads for banking employees?
Faster digitization
Arguably the main benefit of AI-based OCR over traditional digitization methods is its ability to drastically speed up the process. To manually transfer data, an employee needs to carefully copy entire documents one at a time into a computer. This system is acceptable for individual documents on a small scale, but when scaled up to a whole organization it slows down progress and adds to labor expenses.
AI-driven OCR automates the digitization process, enabling banking organizations to handle huge quantities of documents at a time, almost instantaneously. This allows staff to spend less time on digitization and frees up valuable resources for banks to assign to other important areas of the business.
Fraud and error detection
Fraud and data inaccuracies are major concerns for any banking organization, and both can have serious ramifications for customers and the banks themselves. Unfortunately, the nature of the industry means there will always be fraud attempts, and human error is also unavoidable.
While there have been massive advances in fraud detection, automated systems are not infallible, and banks do still regularly rely on manual checking of data. This requires dedicated fraud teams and incurs significant labor costs.
By accurately and automatically capturing data, AI-based OCR can aid fraud and error detection efforts. OCR platforms can also be integrated with existing data systems to facilitate the automatic cross-checking of digitized data. These features can cut down on the reliance on human intervention and help to automate key elements of the important fraud and error detection processes.
Easier storage and sharing
An often overlooked inefficiency in banking administration is the storage and sharing of paper-based documents. While it may seem like a perfectly normal part of banking to manually file, retrieve, and photocopy or scan documents for sharing, these actions all take time and contribute markedly to employee workloads.
One of the main benefits of digital data is that banks can bypass these manual practices of storing and sharing. Digitally stored data is easier to retrieve and can be shared in seconds anywhere in the world.
By adopting modern AI-based OCR, banks can expand their digitization efforts and reduce reliance on outdated paper documentation, helping to cut out the unnecessary work normally associated with storage and sharing.
Simpler customer onboarding
A crucial part of modern business is being able to respond to customer needs rapidly. The first and most critical part of this for any bank is customer onboarding. If you are unable to quickly, accurately, and reliably onboard a customer, they are likely to simply take their business to one of the countless other similar providers.
Unfortunately, onboarding is more complex for banks than it is for most other industries, with credit checks, cross-checking, and other due diligence all part of the process. Some of this is now automated, but much of it needs to be done manually by employees, so any improvements in the efficiency of the process can reduce the pressure on employees.
A large part of onboarding is the monotonous task of digitizing information, so AI-based OCR can directly have a huge impact on its efficiency, cutting down on the need for human intervention in the process.
Why choose Digitise.AI OCR technology?
Digitise.AI’s AI-driven digitization platform uses cutting-edge AI technology to automate the document digitization process for organizations of all kinds, including the banking industry.
Our AI and machine learning experts will pre-train the algorithms powering the Digitise.AI software to immediately and accurately recognize and digitize any document, even highly complex and completely unique formats used by some banks.
AI OCR can significantly reduce the workload on your teams, helping to boost operational efficiency and free up resources for other important areas of your business.
Contact us today to learn more about AI-powered OCR and see Digitise.AI in action.
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