BENGALURU: For 2016 the number of smartphone subscribers in the country has been estimated at 286.3million, an annual inflation by 61.25 percent, as compared to 2010. Such tremendous increase in the count of subscribers and deeper penetration of mobile phones and internet has given a significant boost to the rise of mobile banking over the last few years. For a better insight to help customers and rank retail banks, Forrester concluded its 2016 Mobile Banking functionality benchmark of Indian banks, which included six retail banks operating businesses in the country. 

Scoring 63 out of 100, ICICI topped the list, through an evaluation that assessed the six banks based on 40 criteria. The other five evaluated were Axis Bank, Citibank India, DBS digibank, HDFC Bank, and State Bank of India (SBI). ICICI scored sufficiently higher on the range of touchpoints, transactional features and cross-channel guidance offered through its mobile banking facility.

According to the report, majority (57 percent) of all mobile phones within the country are still feature phones due to which SMS-based services remain the most focused channel among banks to offer their services. On this regard Forrester awards SBI the top spot due to the most comprehensive SMS banking features offered.

Bagging the second spot, right after ICICI, is DBS digibank. Due to a varied platform base supporting the mobile devices, presence across a greater number of platforms is important. HDFC came out at the top with coverage across every major platform— Android, iOS, Windows, Blackberry and Symbian.

Although, DBS digibank and HDFC do offer some basic money management functionalities, the report adds that the evaluated mobile banking contenders lack properly functional money management tools.

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