Awards for Excellence 2020
|
|
If there is one thing that will test a bank’s digital and technology platform it is a global pandemic. The investment that Bank of America has put into all of its digital offerings over the last few years became truly apparent over the first few months of 2020; and it wins the award for North America’s best digital bank.
“Sixty thousand new understandings regarding pandemic assistance were added to Erica in the first few months of the year,” says Aditya Bhasin, head of consumer, small business and wealth management technology.
Erica is the bank’s AI-driven virtual financial assistant, and millions of clients have turned to her for the first time this year, many of whom were baby boomers. Launched in 2018, the number of Erica users had grown to roughly 14 million by May 2020.
|
|
|
Aditya Bhasin, |
Helping its clients make the switch to mobile this year has also been imperative as stay-at-home orders were imposed due to the coronavirus pandemic. It wasn’t just retail clients but also corporate clients, and the bank held more than 20 webinars to advise clients on how to make the shift. It also worked with state governments to issue unemployment insurance payments via prepaid cards.
“We issued more prepaid cards in the first few months than in the whole of last year,” says Julie Harris, head of global banking digital strategy.
And David Tyrie, head of advanced solutions and digital banking, points out that the bank is the largest Paycheck Protection Program provider in the US in terms of number of approved loans.
This kind of rapid adaptation is only possible if there has been a commitment in place for years. The bank spends $10 billion in technology annually, with $3 billion of that being invested in new development.
There have been many notable upgrades to the bank’s digital offerings over the last year. Just one of hundreds is an update to CashPro Mobile that allowed users to pair their Apple Watch with their mobile token and generate a one-time password.
Last summer, an international electronics company completed a mind-blowing $1.6 billion payment on the app using their Apple Watch to generate a token.
In 2019 alone, Bank of America obtained 418 patents – more than in any other year in its history and an increase of 31% year on year. This investment is part of the bank’s overall commitment to responsible banking, and Covid-19 has demonstrated just how much technology and responsibility are connected.
