South Africa’s Standard Bank  is on a committed journey of rapid digitization across Africa, offering its customers more convenient ways to interact with their personal banking services. 

The latest innovation in this digital transformation journey is the expansion of the existing Standard Bank banking app to four additional African markets simultaneously, namely Uganda, Namibia, Ghana and Botswana with plans to roll it out to Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia and Zimbabwe by the end of 2016.

The app already enjoys high usage amongst Standard Bank’s South African and Offshore customers. 

Rapid developments in Standard Bank’s drive to enhance its digital customer interface in Africa and simultaneous multi-country enablement on the continent have been combined with extensive customer testing and prototyping, to deliver a consistent customer experience which is locally relevant to users in each of the four additional markets.

The release of the app is a demonstration of Standard Bank’s significant investment in an enterprise technology framework that is reusable in all its markets, providing a world-class and a consolidated view of banking portfolios within the Group from a single mobile interface. 

Through the single interface customers will enjoy a seamless integration of their personal and business banking profiles, with a singular view of all their accounts across multiple geographies, as well as single sign-on capability from anywhere in the world – all from the convenience of their smart phone.

“Essentially this is one of the first mobile banking interfaces in Africa that allows our bank customers access to their accounts across multiple countries within the Standard Bank Group,” says Adrian Vermooten, Head Customer Channels Africa, Standard Bank.

“It is particularly important to us to ensure we continue to leverage and build banking solutions that ultimately make the lives of our customers easier and more convenient – enabling customers to bank on their terms whenever they want,” he adds.

The app offers a richer and intuitive customer experience as it takes advantage of smartphone sophistication such as biometrics for secure access, access to device contacts, and social networks for sharing of information.

Future releases of the app in late 2016 will include additional features such as Real Time Payments, Online account opening and numerous other value-added services for individuals and businesses.

“The introduction of this app is a further step in Standard Bank’s drive to build a universal bank for its customers across the continent. As a bank that operates in 20 markets across the continent and has a deep understanding of our customers in diverse markets, we are committed to delivering services that are aimed at meeting the needs of our customers and enhancing their banking experience. Africa is our home, we drive her growth” says Mr. Vermooten.