GarantiBank Launches New Mobile Banking Service
Satama’s latest innovation revolutionises the way Turks bank
Satama has designed a versatile and easy-to-use mobile banking solution for Turkey’s third largest private bank, GarantiBank. The service was launched yesterday in Turkey. Satama also provided consultancy on planning and instructing the adoption of the service and will continue to work as GarantiBank’s partner in the further development of the solution. The service stuns by its ease-of-use, speed and versatility.
Garanti Bank offers services for around 6.2 million customers in Turkey and is one of the country’s most innovative organisations; it was amongst the first service providers worldwide to introduce Internet banking. GarantiBank wanted to offer its customers ”the best mobile banking service in the world” and launched cooperation with Satama in May 2007.
Satama’s mobile banking service will greatly facilitate everyday banking for Turks, as only 21.1% of the country’s households have a permanent Internet connection (source: ITU 2006). Now customers are able to take care of all their banking routines, from paying bills to trading stocks and currencies, with mobile devices and are no longer dependent on a permanent Internet connection.
Uniquely Versatile and Fast Solution
“GarantiBank’s new mobile banking solution is an excellent example of a user-friendly service that makes users’ everyday banking easier and makes them independent of the Internet let alone branch opening hours. The users of the new service can forget about queues and save both time and energy,” says Barbaros Uygun, Senior Vice President at GarantiBank.
”We chose Satama to design the service because we wanted the best possible partner. Satama was able to meet our tight deadline and challenged us to make use of the unique characteristics of the mobile channel in our service. We realised that designing services for the mobile channel has to be based on completely different tenets than traditional online services; a mobile device is a lot more than ’the Internet with a smaller screen’. Satama helped us to define what services were relevant to mobile users and would benefit our customers when they are away from their computer. The final solution exceeded all our expectations,” Uygun adds.
”The service covers normal account transactions, such as paying bills and transferring money, but also stock trading and currency exchange, and offers GarantiBank a new marketing channel. As far as we are aware, this is the only mobile banking solution in the world that offers these kinds of services at the moment,” says Kari Kemppi, Business Unit Director at Satama Mobility.
”The client’s key requirements for the service were speed and ease-of-use. The solution’s design is based on Satama’s mobile service development methodology and the service is optimised for the devices available on the Turkish market. This allowed us to maximise user experience by ensuring that the visual elements of the service work in all phones while keeping the concept consistent regardless of the model,” Kemppi continues.
Ease-of-use at the Fore
”Examples of the innovativeness of the service include mobile identification. The users do not need a separate list of access codes like we do in Finland. Instead, they can use their mobile phones to generate one-time access codes with which they can log in to the service. The service is also the first adoption of mobile electronic signature in banking services. In addition, users can similarly use their mobile phones to log in to the Internet bank,” explains Marko Laitinen, Sales Manager at Satama Mobility.
”Another example of the ease-of-use of the service is the ability to send cash to other people. GarantiBank’s customers can use the service to transfer money to a cash point from which the recipient can withdraw the money by typing in a single-use code without needing to have a debit or credit card. This is a handy tool for parents to send money to their children who do not have a debit card, for example. The service also features innovative user-friendly tools for making payments on the go. For example, users can pay the toll bridge charges when crossing the Bosporus in Istanbul using their mobile phone, easily and inexpensively,” Laitinen adds.
The mobile service can be found at: wap.garanti.com.tr
Further information:
Kari Kemppi
Business Unit Director
Satama Mobility
Tel. +358 40 515 0326
e-mail: kari.kemppi@satama.com
Marko Laitinen
Sales Manager
Satama Mobility
Tel. +358 40 724 4398
e-mail: marko.laitinen@satama.com
Satama Interactive Plc is a marketing technology services company. The company’s strength lies in combining marketing with knowledge work expertise and technology. Our services portfolio focuses on three core business areas: Marketing, Productivity and Mobility. There are 370 experts in the Satama Group. We are based in Finland in Helsinki, Tampere and Turku, and in Amsterdam, Dusseldorf and Stockholm. Satama’s net sales in 2006 were EUR 35.8 million. Satama Interactive Plc (SAI1V) shares are listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange. www.satama.com
GarantiBank International N.V. is owned by GarantiBank Turkey, one of the three largest financial institutions of Turkey. GarantiBank International N.V. has been functioning under the laws of the Netherlands and the supervision of the Dutch Central Bank (DNB). GarantiBank International's mission is to be recognised, by our stakeholders and even competitors, as the most reliable and respectable bank within our niche markets by: offering speedy and accurate services, providing tailor made, innovative and country specific solutions and investing in cutting-edge technology and in our human resources. www.garantibank.com