LONDON: With reputations tarnished by the financial crisis and a string of scandals, Britain’s top banks are trying to adapt and move ahead by embracing mobile technology.

Four years ago, Lloyds Banking Group did not have a single customer accessing services via a smartphone, but today there are five million using such apps — and counting.

“This provides huge opportunities for how we serve our customers,” said Nick Williams, consumer digital director at Lloyds.

The trend is echoed across the industry. In 2015, Britain’s banking industry body BBA expects 427 million branch transactions for the whole sector, compared to 895 million transactions on mobile phones. British consumers are now among the top users of banking smartphone applications in developed nations.

“UK consumers were relatively slow in their adoption of online banking but have embraced mobile banking thanks to the ease and convenience of managing your money on the move,” said Philip Benton, an analyst at Euromonitor International.

“It’s understandable that the UK retail banking sector is betting on these new technologies.”

A recent Euromonitor survey found 36% of British consumers have used a smartphone to access banking services in the past month. That compares with 44% in the United States, 39% in Australia, 32% in France and 19% in Germany and Japan. — AFP

This article first appeared in digitaledge Daily, on August 10, 2015.