Current Issue Related to ICT in HSBC Amanah Malaysia Bank

Nowadays, the advancement of technologies has contribute a slight improvement in

financial sector by the continuous innovation by the experts. The most well-known financial
technology which currently used by the society is mobile and internet banking. Mobile
banking is a service provided by a bank or other financial institution that allows its customers to
conduct financial transactions using a mobile device such as a mobile phone or tablet. It uses
software, usually called an app, provided by the financial institution. Mobile banking is usually
available on a 24-hour basis. HSBC Amanah Malaysia Bank is one of the bank who also provide
this facility with the name HSBC Mobile Banking. Eventhough HSBC Amanah Malaysia
Berhad is just the subsidiary of HSBC Bank Malaysia, they used the same mobile banking
apps. Same goes to internet banking, but both conventional and Islamic bank of HSBC Bank use
different webpage for the user to access. But still, the functionality is most likely the same. The
different might be seen by the type of products offered by them. As any other banks, transactions
through mobile and internet banking may include obtaining account balances and lists of latest
transactions, electronic bill payments, and funds transfers between a customer's or
another's accounts.
From the bank's point of view, mobile banking reduces the time and cost of handling
transactions by reducing the need for customers to visit a bank branch for cash withdrawal and
deposit transactions. Mobile banking does not handle transactions involving cash, it is all just
done virtually. Despite the benefits offered by them, we still have to concern on certain issues
regarding the compatibility of the apps, security issue and the acceptance by the public.
The first issue is obviously seen in mobile banking apps rather than online banking. As
time passed by, more technology capabilities have to be met. This requires an update from time
to time to cater the massive changes in customers devices. In HSBC Mobile Banking app, the
ratings is quite disappointed which shows the unsatisfied from the customers perspective. To
summarize the comments, there are few crucial points to be mentioned here. First, many of them

complains on the unpleasant user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design. This banks
mobile apps is somehow really look outdated and also complicated to use it as even the simplest
operation is very hard to do. Some of customers questioned the accessibility of this apps why it
is not the same level of service to android users as offered by iPhone users who can sign in using
fingerprint? HSBC should consider this feature in order to increase the accessibility of this apps
to everyone. Not only that, the HSBC mobile banking apps required too many pass codes in
order to login. This regulation seems like it is good for the sake of security but it will slightly
affect the time consumed by the customers to what they are wished to do. It should be
straightforward instead of make them feel frustrated. Some claims that it is rarely works. There is
always a message pop up saying that youve been away for too long after it buffers for a while
to log in. Then it says internet banking temporarily unavailable and to try again later. This
problem also lead to the previous result, waste of time and tiring. To some extent, they prefer to
use the online banking by using web browser. The IT experts in the bank should tackle all the
problems as soon as possible to ensure the sustainibilty of this facility. There is still lot of room
of improvement that HSBC bank have to look into.
Next, HSBCs mobile banking apps is also vulnerable to security issue as it keep
updating and improving their technical aspect it somehow create more bug. For example as what
have been practiced in previous usage, there used to be an option to generate a secure code in
order to set up a new transfer to another account but now its no longer there but it keep asking
the customer to generate it. This safety issue will result in the fear of the customer to use this
apps. In order to gain the trust from customers, HSBC should take layers of safety measures or
authentication and ensure it is well functioning for long term such as pin code to ascertain what
one knows, biometric recognition like thumbprint or iris to ascertain what one has and some
other related security devices. HSBC Bank also have to take some preventive measure to avoid
other common cybercrime case such as identity theft, transaction fraud, money loundering etc.
Last but not least, the issue regarding lack of acceptance by the public. This is very
common in any bank, in fact it was faced globally regardless society, place and time. It happens
when people are afraid to try something new especially to those veteran who used to live their
daily routine by traditional way and also those who live in rural area with no accessibility on the
ITs infrastructure. According to International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Malaysia, from

the latest statistic, there are only 68% internet subscribers in this country which means the rest
32% of population is still in a group so called IT-Illiterate. The driven force of this problem is
due to lack of knowledge and exposure. They do not know how this mobile banking works and
its usefulness, they still prefer to go to the bank to do the money withdrawal and deposit
manually, even some of them still use the book instead of ATM card. Therefore, HSBC Amanah
bank should raise these communitys confident by providing sufficient information, manual or
guide on the easiness to use this apps and the benefits from it. This can be done by collaborating
with the village association to conduct a program with the objective to spread the awareness
which focusing on the usefulness and the ease of use of mobile banking and not to forget, in the
banks branch itself should do more promotion on the usage of mobile banking. As a result, it
will change their mind to adopt the mobile banking