Banking redefined - Digital Banking that works!. Review on DBS Bank

Jun 2018

I am reducing the rating from 5 to 4 after some more goof ups by the bank:

• They disabled the options for deep linking UPI payments with your own apps. A clear feedback was given about how they can improve. They have taken steps backward instead by removing existing functionality.

  
  




• Record keeping is a consistent problem. You'll have to struggle to figure out source/destination of any transaction. They give some meanignless "batch ref no" which can be same for multiple transactions.(Quite shocked when I found that.)

  
  




• Last entry on a page in the statement is always broken. Nothing done about this feedback.

  
  

Will be lowering their rating further if they don't improve.

Dec 2017

There are a couple of pleasant additions to digibank

1. NACH mandate. You can now pay EMIs using NACH mandate. This was introduced in Oct 2017

   
   




2. Internet Banking - Introduced today 12 Dec 2017.

   
   

Both are great moves.

As I wrote before, if they do above two things, I'd revise their rating from 4 to 5. I am keeping my word and revising the rating to 5 today.

Oct 2017

Some more problems realized till now:

• This is one of the most nasty bugs in the app. The interest paid entry appears in duplicate. On complaining they say, on the back end it is only once and that is the one that "matters". They just don't look willing to fix this and are even passing on the blame on my device not being(possibly) supported.

  
  




• Interest is paid quarterly, but entries do not necessarily reflect in the bank statement produced by the app. On complaining they offered to send print statement with interest entry added, but refused to email a soft copy saying they can't send emails.

  
  




• You can't set a future dated payment.

  
  

But as of now there is no better alternative that works fully digitally and pays best in class interest. Kotak 811 service is the only other one that works, but their service is poorer and interest less.

Jul 2017

Update:

Some issues faced till now, though I am not lowering the rating. Hope they may improve upon these:

• On changing SIM card(as I ported out of Idea, see my review of Idea on that) there is a funny pop up appearing on every login asking to register new "device", but the pop up is not responsive on clicking the "Register" button. Reported the issue. Nothing happened yet. They may take long to fix. Hope they are working on it.

  
  




• Did an mVisa transaction on idea cellular site to make my final payment before porting out. Funds deducted from my a/c but not reached idea. Do not know whose fault this is - dbs or visa or idea, but what I know for sure is it's the payer who is suffering. Now the bank says it will take 45 days to revert the transaction. UPDATE: After 60 days of wait they have still not refunded the amount. Have to take it to ombudsman now.

  
  




• Further for above disputed transaction, they sent an email saying "we are pleased to inform you that the amt has been credited back to your a/c" and closed the issue. On complaining the chat agent says "It's just a system generated mail". What do they mean - their systems are entitled to make false financial statements?

  
  




• The BHIM based QR code does not work with digibank app. It just goes to home screen without giving any error. Although mVisa QR code "works", but then above is the story of how it "worked". In short QR code experience with this app is bad.

  
  




• QR code based payments do not work as of now. You type "Complete payment" and nothing happens. Bank saysy it's a "known issue"

  
  




• The monthly statements are available as late as 10th of next month, that too not mailed to you. You have to download from app.

  
  




• The statement generation is buggy. Last transaction on a page gets cut if it does not fit on the page and is not shown on the next page, thus cutting the description making it impossible to relate the transaction.

  
  




• Payment screens are buggy. If you make two back to back payments it sometimes auto-fills last payment details including amount. This is very dangerous.

  
  




• If you try to make a payment TO your linked UPI account it asks for PIN of the TARGET account. This is never expected and even after entering, the transaction fails.

  
  




• Besides as mentioned in last round of review below, lack of internet banking continues to be a big negative.

  
  

Jul 2017

With a let down by established brick and mortar banks like Bank of Maharashtra(see my recent review on them), to an extent where a number of my online payments had got stuck for days because of their stupid session management in their software, I needed another bank account quickly - I mean really quickly.

The search for the right bank began. Past pathetic experience ruled out ICICI, HDFC, Axis, SBI.(Have reviews on why all these are pathetic.)

Wanted a bank that would allow me to open Aadhar based account fully online.

Tried "Insta Account" of Yes Bank. Found that it did not even ask for Aadhar anywhere. It just accepted form and nothing happened further - no call or anything. Also filed in the category of "Customizable Account", same story. A deafening silence after you submit the online account opening form.

Tried "RBL Abacus account", about which I recently read that in some survey its customer service was regarded as the best. Do not know about that, but IT is immature with this bank - sole reason why I was doing away with BoM in the first place. The Aadhar based a/c opening existed, but wasn't functioning. It won't go beyond the stage of entering your profile. Tried repeatedly and then got a dreaded message saying something like since you tried so many times now you must go to the branch and open a normal account. So end of the RBL story there.

Impressed with IDFC advertisements and relatively uncluttered portal, wanted to try their online account opening. But it is not yet available in Pune. So ruled out.

Tried IDBI's online account opening. Their mobile number widget would simply keep saying wrong entry without even allowing you to type any text. So, far behind in IT still.

Kotak seemed to offer online account, but the schedule of charges looked quite complicated and by this time I wasn't sure whether this would work either.

Finally decided to Try DBS Digibank. Had gone through it earlier but rejected as there was no way to deposit Cash in this completely paperless bank. But after seeing no other option, decided to use the likes of BoM to just accept cash. BoM is just next door to me and given their IT they deserve to be used merely as cash counters. The moment I deposit cash and step out of the bank I would move it to DBS and treat DBS Digibank as my primary account.

Things that I liked about DBS Digibank are(with a few small dislikes embedded in some sentences):

• This is good mix, draws the strengths of "payment banks" but without their limitations. It's fully digital, technology driven, provides higher interest rates like payment banks, but it does not have the restrictions of a payment bank on the balance you can maintain, complex schedule of charges for payments etc. This approach is going to give run for their money to both the payments banks and traditional banks, at least among the tech savvy class.

  
  




• The digital account opening actually works, fully automatically. Others claim so, but(barring possibly IDFC which I haven't tried), but it doesn't work that smoothly on ground.

  
  




• There are no myriad types of accounts with different schedules of charges to choose from confusing you totally. It's plain simple basic banking, no min balance, no online txn charges. Only debit card is charged, that too from second year. Debit card is mandatory because it serves as address verification in fully digitized process.

  
  




• True to its word, it's a completely paperless bank, no cheque book either, which could be a disadvantage for some. But I have anyway nearly eliminated cheque usage by insisting payees to provide a/c details.

  
  




• You instantly get a virtual debit card and within 1/2 days get a physical debit card which works at any bank's ATM anywhere in India any number of times, no restriction whatsoever(except RBI restrictions on amount etc.).

  
  




• It's a branchless bank as well, though if that worries you, most major cities listed on their site do have a physical branch. You'll hardly need to go there though.

  
  




• You get an interest of 7% for a balance up to 1 lakh and 6% above it. This is more than double of minimal rate that most traditional banks offer.

  
  




• UPI is supported, even of other banks like most UPI applications do.

  
  




• You are not asked to worry about whether to choose IMPS or NEFT etc. It's just plain simple funds transfer. The bank system will "do the needful" to transfer your money and no charges whatsoever on these transactions. You get full details of transaction, you can write even notes on transaction, you can write those notes even after payment is completed - unlike some banks which write just cryptic numbers for IMPS in your statement.

  
  




• Your account is initially opened as a digital wallet which has some restrictions and once you authorize it with finger prints at a nearby Cafe Cofee Day outlet it becomes a full account with only RBI imposed limits on transfers etc. BTW, finding an outlet where fingerprints are validated was a bit of pain. The list wasn't available online, was available only in the app, and most of the shops listed there had no clue about this. Even not all Cafe outlets support this, but you can ask them and they may tell you the nearby one that supports this.

  
  




• There is a "virtual assistant" to answer all your basic queries. But be warned, there is no traditional customer service or at least I didn't notice it. Fortunately the technology is so reliable that you may not need those things.

  
  




• At this stage the app is a bit slow and lacks sophistication in many scenarios such as finding nearest outlet for authentication. But those are one time scenarios.

  
  




• Lack of internet banking is a big downside, if it matters to you. They should allow internet banking for Digibank holders also.

  
  




• There is no way to get a pdf receipt of payment to share with the payee.

  
  




• There are no email alerts for transaction.

  
  




• The Digibank account does not support any NACH or ECS mandates, to for example pay loan EMIs from it. If they support it(and NACH is anyway digital) this account will become even more attractive.

  
  

I'd rate them 5 if they could overcome some of the above shortcomings.

So, having cornered by BoM's stupid session management that locked me out of my own account for days, within a matter of hours, I could not only open my account, activate it fully, pull money from the locked BoM account instantly over UPI and finish my pending payments. It was all so smooth, that I don't think I'll go back to traditional banks now.

Hope other banks learn from this and there is a good competition to give a better and better user experience like this. And if they refuse to learn from this, they are going to get marginalized, if not extinct.