Kotak Mahindra Bank has launched Kotak Now, an app that would allow new customers to open an account in a simpler and cost-effective manner. The bank said this is for the first time a bank in the country had come with such an app, which can be used by a customer to open a bank account. Deepak Sharma, chief digital officer of the bank, said this is an end-to-end application wherein a customer will be able to open a bank account within 10 minutes, without worrying about visiting a branch or any other merchant. After downloading the application, the customer will have to enter his or her mobile number and then key in a one-time password to establish identity. After this they need to upload an image of either his or her passport or the Aadhaar card. The customer will then have to get connected through a video chat with one of the KMB executives and the account gets opened. The bank has tied-up with a German start-up ‘WebID’ which has a patented technology to establish identities through specially built algorithms and has already implemented it in 30 banks worldwide. At present, the process has been implemented only for current accounts and will be soon expanded to other offerings.
