Finacle Blog

Which is why, the idea of a virtual vault, or an e-locker for documents is so appealing. This is an innovative service much like a locker, offered by banks for customers to store copies of their important documents such as school certificates, social security cards, birth and marriage certificates, Wills, et al in electronic format. For customers, the advantages are obvious - easy access to these papers from anywhere, and saving the bother of submitting documents to the bank each time they acquire a new product. But banks can benefit too. A virtual vault gives them access to more customer documentation than they would otherwise, assuring them of the customers' identity to strengthen their KYC performance. And perhaps a new business opportunity to authenticate customers on behalf of Government agencies, or when sought by customers themselves in order to fulfill statutory requirements.

Caveat: As is the case with all things online, banks must ensure that the virtual vault is absolutely tamper-proof and secure, else ID thieves and hackers will have a field day.

But while all of the above is nice to have, the real deal is for the virtual vault to serve as a 'backup' set of original documents should they be lost or misplaced. Anyone who has gone through the process of claiming the loss of an original document (application, declaration, surety, even a police complaint!) would straightaway recognise the worth of such a facility. Until that happens all we can do is file away our papers and keep our fingers crossed!