How SC Ventures and OneSpan simplify document handling and signatures at Standard Chartered

RGK Ganesh,

From papers delivered by courier to a fully digitized process: SC Ventures collaborated with OneSpan to create SC eSign, a tool accelerating document sharing and signing for all Standard Chartered business units across the bank’s large footprint.

SC Ventures

SC Ventures, the business unit that provides the platform and catalyst for Standard Chartered to promote innovation, partnered with OneSpan, the global leader in digital banking transaction security and e-signatures, to create SC eSign. The tool revolutionized the digital signing experience at the Bank by processing over 1,800 transactions per month for 40 use cases across various business units. SC eSign is live in 21 countries (as of October 2021) and secured regulatory approval for use in a total of 28 jurisdictions.

Before: struggling with time-intensive document sharing and signing

Signing of documents by clients is a time-consuming process for the mortgage specialists at Standard Chartered, especially since the outbreak of the pandemic. In the case of new customers, documents were emailed or delivered by courier to the client, and then a video conference had to be set up so that the customer manager could witness the client signing the documents.

After the signing, the clients either sent the documents back by scanning and emailing a copy or by courier. Upon receiving the signed documents, a call-back by Standard Chartered to the client was required to confirm the receipt of the documents. Beyond just the mortgage team, many business units at Standard Chartered were struggling with time-intensive document signing and manual coordination.

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“Digitizing these processes is the way of the future”

SC Ventures prioritized the launch of a single enterprise solution for e-signatures. With the pandemic reinforcing the need for new digital solutions, SC Ventures partnered with OneSpan to deploy the technology on its cloud infrastructure. OneSpan specializes in digital identity and anti-fraud solutions that combine security with good user experiences. OneSpan has developed best practices for digital workflows across internal, B2B, and B2C banking use-cases over the past two decades helping banks and lenders to go paperless.

"There is no doubt that digitizing processes is the way of the future,” says Sameer Hajarnis, Global E-Signature Practice Leader at OneSpan. “Our solution helps the Bank significantly reduce document handling costs, increase completion rates, reduce risk, and improve the customer experience by providing a completely digital signing process.”

“SC eSign has changed the way we engage our customers, and puts customer experience at the centre of performing document signing. SC Ventures led the rapid rollout to production, took the Bank along on the journey, and successfully transferred the operations of this innovative platform back into the Bank,” says Thorsten Neumann, SC Ventures, who has been leading the initiative as chief technical officer.

Now: fully digitized workflow of sending, signing, and receiving documents

The partnership between SC Ventures and OneSpan has resulted in rapid rollout of SC eSign. The platform provides multiple Standard Chartered business units with a significantly faster and more intuitive means to share confidential documentation. A Bank employee uploads documents to SC eSign, provides client notification details, and SC eSign notifies all signatories of the newly available signing ceremony via email. Participants both internally and externally can access the document via their web browser, review the document and “click to sign”.

With OneSpan Sign e-signature technology, the customer signing experience has been greatly improved. And for the mortgage team in particular, efficiency is enhanced by reducing time to close transactions.

After the signing is completed, SC eSign notifies the transaction originator of the completed, signed documents and any uploaded attachments. These signed documents are available from the central platform for download and the customer signing experience has been greatly improved. Also, efficiency, for the mortgage team in particular, is enhanced by reducing turnaround time to close transactions by more than 100%, freeing up time to serve more clients and generate more sales.

“In the evaluation of OneSpan, we found the e-signature platform was superior in its capability with notifications and reminders, 2-factor authentication (2FA) options, access to APIs for workflow automation, and the adaptability to integrate 3rd party identity providers, e.g. Aadhaar in India and SingPass in Singapore. We look forward to continue to roll SC eSign to more business units,” adds Neunamm.

OneSpan and Standard Chartered Discuss SC eSign
Video

OneSpan and Standard Chartered Discuss SC eSign

Learn how SC Ventures partnered with OneSpan to implement SC eSign across 21 countries and 40 processes within Standard Chartered.

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About SC Ventures FinTech Bridge

SC Ventures Fintech Bridge is our global platform connecting and matching partners such as startups, investors, ecosystem partners and our corporate clients to the Bank’s communities to find solutions to diverse type of problem statements. Standard Chartered offers direct connections at a global scale for collaborations and future partnerships.

About SC Ventures

SC Ventures is a platform and a catalyst for Standard Chartered to promote innovation, invest in disruptive financial technology and explore alternative business models. Focused on “Rewiring the DNA in banking”, SC Ventures leverages on human-centric design, lean start-up approach and fintech enablement, while nurturing an intrapreneurial culture by empowering people to take initiative. We deliver forward-thinking innovations through an open platform and a network of people and partnerships. https://scventures.io/

This article, written by RGK Ganesh, Member of SC Ventures at SC Ventures | Standard Chartered, was first published on SC Ventures FinTechBridge in November 2021.