Two in five European customer have been unable to access financial services because of Covid-19 and a lack of access to digital options, according to new research from digital identity company Signicat.
Having commissioned Sapio Research to conduct the research, Signicat ended up seeing 4,043 individuals who have applied for a financial product in the last 12 months being polled for the survey. The survey respondents were split across the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Finland and Norway.
Of the people polled, 41% said they had been unable to access new financial services. The research follows from the pandemic restricting face-to-face interactions and introducing other restrictions on access to financial services.
However, only 20% were understanding of this limitation, while a third couldn’t see why fully digital onboarding wasn’t possible in 2020.
“Our regular research into consumer attitudes around digital onboarding has found that financial services have struggled to keep up with consumer demands in the later years,” said Asger Hattel, CEO of Signicat. “One of the effects of the pandemic has been to bring this into sharp focus, turning a desire for digital services into a desperate need. Consumers expect to be digital customers which are, according to big banks, 2-3 times more profitable and more loyal than branch-only customers.
“The majority of consumers want the option of banking 100% digitally, including the initial application and onboarding. Digital onboarding is in fact crucial, as consumers will see it as a preview of the service – a poor user experience will lead to many abandoned applications.”
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