Nearly 1.5M Underbanked Filipinos Onboarded With RCBC’s DiskarTech App
by Fintech News Philippines August 26, 2020With over 2 million mobile app downloads in two months, Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC) has pushed for digital adoption, recording more than 1.43 million new accounts onboarded digitally during the lockdown.
An estimated 610,000 DiskarTech basic deposit account holders went through the three-minute electronic know-your-customer (KYC) verification from over 2 million who downloaded the mobile app. About 822,720 DiskarTech Lite restricted transactional accounts received emergency cash grants from the government’s social amelioration program.
The funds are disbursed on-site through the help of RCBC-DiskarTech’s payout partners composed of rural banks, payment centers, pawnshops, and sari-sari stores (the local term for convenience stores).
Benjamin Diokno
“I welcome the update from RCBC on the 1.43 million new digital accounts created through its DiskarTech “Taglish” inclusion super app. This is a clear indication of how our banks and financial institutions are building on BSP’s policies and regulations to bring financial services closer to the Filipinos.
We look forward to these accounts being fully used by their account holders so that they can truly benefit from being financially included. We are confident that, together, we will achieve our collective goal of bringing 70% of adult Filipinos to formal financial system by 2023 as a means toward a robust, inclusive and sustainable digital economy,”
said Benjamin Diokno, Governor of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).
RCBC is among the financial services providers tapped by the Department of Social Welfare and Development in quickly disbursing emergency cash subsidy in at least eight regions nationwide. It has disbursed an aggregate total in excess of P8.3 billion utilising its DiskarTech Lite disbursement platform and handheld ATM Go devices distributed across 72 out of 81 provinces nationwide through its payout partners.
Eugene Acevedo
“Real and imagined barriers to banking have been addressed through this unique initiative. We are happy to be a partner of the BSP toward a robust, inclusive and sustainable digital economy. At the same time, we are also glad to be a partner of the unbanked and underserved Filipinos in providing their financial service requirements during this difficult time,”
said RCBC President and CEO Eugene S. Acevedo.
Lito Villanueva
“This was the perfect occasion to show our commitment to financial inclusion and leverage technology for the public good in time of a crisis,”
said Lito Villanueva, Executive Vice President and Chief Innovation and Inclusion Officer of RCBC.
Since its launch in July, DiskarTech has identified most of its users as young adults outside of Metro Manila. Account holders aged 21 to 30 comprise 60%, followed by those between 31 and 40 years old at 25%. Meanwhile, only 37% reside in Metro Manila and the rest are distributed across all the regions of the country, including the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao.
DiskarTech reached one million downloads just 38 days from its market launch and ranked second overall amongst mobile apps in the country by Google Play Store and Apple Store.
Featured image credit: edited from Business photo created by freepik – www.freepik.com
