Some bankers have ruled out huge layoffs of their human resource following the adoption of modern technologies in their operations.
According to them, the job losses could largely be blamed on the inability of institutions to draw a clear balance in their innovation.
“We developed some innovative products which we call the Omni Bank pay house these are kiosk models that are spread across the country we have about twenty of them now by the end of the year we will have about 100 of them and people can go there and deposit into their wallets or their accounts they can go there and open accounts and do all sorts of things so if you ask me we are rather going to increase employment,” the Managing Director of Omni Bank, Philip Oti Mensah told Citi Business News.
The need to tap into the huge unbanked population in emerging economies like Ghana has resulted in the creation of new and innovative systems to attract more deposits.
Some banks for instance have adopted electronic platforms and cashless systems which require less human interface.
There has also been a gradual increase in use of payment platforms provided by partnerships between telecom companies and banks.
More recently, there has also been the adoption of transaction cards that enables holders purchase goods and services as well as make deposits into their bank accounts.
Mr. Oti Mensah whose company is among the new entrants in the banking industry further stressed that though technology has become inevitable among financial institutions, his outfit will continue to effectively combine the two to provide tailor made solutions.
“People still need to have what we call the deposit convenience, you know if you have cash in your pocket you still need to deposit at some point before it comes to your phone or to your account so we are going to combine technology and low cost branches and in this sense.”
Official statistics indicate that total number of cards issued under the e-zwich payment platform have increased from 496,538 in 2010 to 1,791, 387 as at September 2016.
Similarly, the value of transactions has also increased from 84.5 million cedis to 1.26 billion cedis between the six year period.
Also, total number of registered mobile money customers has increased from 3,778,374 in 2012 to about 18,862,941 as at September this year.
In addition, total value of transactions have increased from 594 million cedis in 2012 to 51.43 billion cedis as at September 2016.
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By: Pius Amihere Eduku/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana
