Just in Time Group (JIT) reached another milestone in Sri Lanka’s tech landscape by helping the People’s Bank in its digitisation program.
A significant number of People’s Bank branches are now complete ‘digital branches’.
“The partnership with People’s Bank was a decision that was easily made. JIT already had a proven record of accomplishment with the bank begun 18 years ago with the ATM Switch project. Moving forward was easier as JIT already understood the bank’s processors and protocols – where efficiency and fluidity were key aspects for the digitisation process implemented from both sides,” said JIT CEO Chrishan Mendis.
The digitisation process began with the deploying of the system, which took nearly a year. The subsequent two and a half years were spent on work to ensure that the deployment went smoothly. Digitising each service of the Bank included a task force comprising the JIT team, more than hundred staff from the bank itself and other stakeholders.
Building the infrastructure was key. Yet, despite JIT offering the right platform, digitising the Bank wasn’t something that happened overnight. “It’s not simply bringing a platform and plugging it in,” said Mendis.
Head of IT, Peoples’ Bank, Sandalal Edirisinghe said, “Everything that you do, from Facebook, hotel bookings, happens digitally. As a bank if you don’t have your services through this channel, then there’s no digitisation. Our teller traffic has reduced by 60%.”
“Within 10-15 minutes you become an end to end customer. You’re accessing your account, paying your bills, and you walk out. Every service is enabled and you only need to bring your NIC. With traditional banking, you need 2 to 3 days. Going forward, you won’t need to come to a branch,” he said.