SCB improves digital banking offering

British banking giant Standard Chartered has enhanced its digital banking suite to better serve clients in the Philippines.

Standard Chartered Bank (SCB), the first foreign bank to set up shop in the country, recently launched an integrated foreign exchange payment service for local institutional clients. The service is embedded in the payment processing workflow.

The new offering, called Straight2Bank Foreign Exchange, is seen to offer an efficient option for foreign exchange settlement. Payment instructions can be initiated from a single centralized account and settled across over 15 payment currencies.

The foreign exchange is booked either by an auto-booking functionally within the payment processing systems or via a self-service foreign exchange pricing tool. This new process is designed to make it simpler and faster for clients to request for a foreign exchange quote and book a deal through Straight2Bank. This allows the clients to streamline and automate the foreign booking, thereby eliminating the need to call the bank just to book a foreign exchange trade.

SCB Philippines has also completed its electronic branch banking system harmonization program and upgraded the system to offer a wide range of technical and functional capabilities. These include: standardization across its markets, an enhanced user interface and additional interest pricing options, among others.

The bank is also currently working on the infrastructure to host its core banking application in a public cloud. —DORIS DUMLAO-ABADILLA