OCBC Bank allows Siri to help customers make e-payments

The virtual assistant can also check bank balances and credit card details.

Apple’s virtual assistant, Siri, will now be able to help OCBC Bank customers check their bank account balances and make electronic payments.

OCBC Bank today launched voice-powered conversational banking for the users of the latest version of its mobile banking app.

Customers can check their bank balances and credit card details by simply saying, “Hey Siri, what’s my balance?”, or “How much money do I have in my bank account?”, or “What is my credit card spend?”. They can then authenticate the transaction using facial recognition or fingerprint.

Besides that, customers can make e-payments to any bank account in Singapore even those that are not linked to the PayNow service. PayNow is a nationwide peer-to-peer service that allows fund transfers using mobile or National Registration Identity Card (NRIC) numbers.

“This is the new digital – conversational, more natural and faster access to banking! This latest service marks a major milestone in banking as it brings us one huge leap closer to making natural language voice-activated banking and payments a reality,” said Aditya Gupta, head of OCBC Bank’s E-Business in Singapore, in a press release.

The new voice banking technology was developed by OCBC Bank’s in-house mobile developer and E-Business Team. The service is only available to iPhones running at least iOS11. Authentication using facial recognition is only available on iPhone X devices.

OCBC Bank recently rolled out facial recognition technology in their branches to identify premier banking customers.