Even rivals recognize that OTP Bank has advanced strongly in digital banking recently, ensuring that its technology wins and retains customers in Hungary and across central and eastern Europe.
“OTP was sometimes overlooked as a digital bank in the past, but should not be underestimated in this area,” warns one regional rival.
That message is certainly apparent in OTP’s achievements in digital banking, an area overseen by deputy chief executive Péter Csányi. In early 2022, OTP added more than 15 features to its mobile banking portal when it introduced the new MobilBank app. The new functions included tools for personal finance management, open banking, savings and term deposits, currency transfers, payments using QR codes and by instalments.
In open banking, for example, it extended its multi-bank functionality to provide external balances and account history, and extended the list of supported banks. OTP counts itself the leading open-banking provider in the region in terms of the number of connections established with other banks. Its open banking requests have exceeded 100,000 a month.
Additional tools for personal finance management include new user-generated expense categories, automatically displaying a monthly chart to show users what they’re spending their money on. It also launched a new recommendation engine, making use of machine learning on individuals’ use of OTP’s platforms to better understand sales potential.
According to OTP, chatbot flows now support almost half of its incoming conversations; almost a quarter of its conversations were end-to-end chatbot flows without live support. In addition, it introduced a new customer identification method at branch level using corporate mobile phones and digital signature pads. Housing loans, including state-subsidized loans, require just one branch visit, the regulatory minimum.
According to OTP, chatbot flows now support almost half of its incoming conversations
For small and medium-sized enterprises and freelancers, OTP has launched a scalable cloud-based platform to connect invoicing and banking, allowing customers to create and send invoices, and receive payments. It also includes features for account reconciliation and managing tax payments.
It launched OTP Otthon, a housing platform that allows users to browse more than 150,000 homes for sale and rent, and to advertise their homes for free. Other ‘beyond banking’ digital initiatives at OTP include a new doctor booking service.
