Lloyds Bank adds passport scanning to its app to speed up customer onboarding
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The UK’s Lloyds Bank recently added a new feature to its app — an in-app passport scanning. According to the bank, the new feature will allow its customers to be the first in the UK to be able to support their bank account application using their passport chips.
How does the new passport scanning feature work?
The new feature was made possible thanks to Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, which is used to scan the chip found in the UK passport.
The bank said that this will significantly speed up the process of ID verification by pre-populating key data fields, such as name, title, gender, date of birth, and country of birth.
Lloyds Bank’s head of product, packaged bank accounts & transformation, Surina Somal, commented on the new addition to the app, stating that unlocking technology is the key in making it easier for UK citizens to bank with Lloyds. The users can rely on the existing tech that can already be found within passports to open and complete their bank account application by using nothing but their phones.
However, Lloyds does not intend to stop here. Somal noted that this is only the first of many updates that the bank has in store for its application and that new ones will come out over the next several months.
Lloyds is dedicated to giving its customers the best possible experience, and adding unique new features such as this one is only one of the ways that the bank is trying to achieve that goal.
Lloyds Bank’s recent achievements
Another move to do so was reported last month, in October 2023, when Lloyds Bank collaborated with FreedomPay, a well-known commerce platform, which allowed it to provide multiple efficient and secure payment solutions to its clients. Essentially, the partnership allowed merchants using Lloyds Bank Cardnet to access the advanced payment processing tech that FreedomPay has to offer.
As a result, users gained access to flexible transactions across borders, service providers, and sectors.
Apart from partnering with FreedomPay, Lloyds also developed its own digital trading solution last month. The bank explained that the goal is to support businesses by allowing them to transact more efficiently.
The solution essentially allows customers to request digital Direct Guarantees on Standby Letters of Credit, thus helping the clients trade more effectively, securely, and safely.
The passport scanning feature is, therefore, only the latest high-tech feature that the bank has integrated, and, according to its statement, it is far from being the last one.
