A card service that keeps up with our expectations

Today’s consumers expect to have everything they want at their fingertips, exactly when they want it. So why should it be any different when it comes to banking services? IDEMIA’s Smart Instant Issuance leads the way in personalized, speedy card issuance.

Sky high expectations

Our daily digital habits have turned us into an “I-want-it-now” generation of consumers. Uber gives us a trackable chauffeur who arrives within minutes, with water and the requisite charging hub. With just a few taps, Amazon delivers our favorite products within a day – or an hour for the truly urgent. Global coffee kingpin Starbucks lets us pre-order our morning dose of caffeine just the way we like it and even makes suggestions based on purchase history.

These services raise the bar on our expectations of convenience, personalization, efficiency and immediacy in just about every aspect of our lives. At IDEMIA, we believe these trends are also shaping and transforming our relationship with our banks.

As consumers, our credit and debit cards are our keys to the world. So why would we wait four or five days for a replacement after losing our wallet? Or after opening a new bank account? IDEMIA’s end-to-end Smart Instant Issuance service applies the same measure of expectations we have as consumers to the use cases of financial institutions. For customers, this means a seamless and effortless, extremely rapid and personalizable service; for banks, this solution can be a key differentiator and an excellent tool to gain new customers and retain existing ones.

Revolutionizing card issuance

Think about the last time your card was lost or stolen. Chances are you waited precious days to receive your new card in the mail – and likely an additional 24-48 hours for your assigned PIN code. This time lost represents not only a huge inconvenience for customers, but a loss as well for banks when customer accounts go quiet for several days.

With Smart Instant Issuance you no longer need to wait. You can head directly into your local bank branch, prove your identity and walk out with a personalized bank card, configured with your selected PIN code and the design of your choice, in less than 10 minutes. For the digital natives among us, this process can also be completed entirely from the comforts of home – all you need to do is pick up the card.

With the substantial gains in wait time, the next logical question is: how safe is this technology? Simply put, very safe. Banks offering this service are equipped with the hardware (a card printer housed in a dedicated and secured room) and the software (IDEMIA’s unique card personalization system) in-branch. IDEMIA’s end-to-end solution guarantees an ultra-secure process every step of the way. For starters, our suite of digital enrollment and eContracting solutions help banks onboard customers in-branch or remotely. Secondly, we have cultivated an expertise in card issuance – delivering a large range of cards and alternative form factors to 1,800 financial institutions each year. Our credential issuance engine is not only a strong area of expertise for IDEMIA, it is also the heart of this solution.

On top of that, when you pick up your new card, you can also get a dematerialized version in your mobile wallet, allowing you to pay with a wave of your smartphone.

The future of Smart Instant Issuance

While this service has already been a great success in certain regions – namely in the US and the UAE – it is beginning to gain significant traction all around the world. Why? Because we see it as a win for everyone. Not only does the in-person pick-up get cards into the hands of cardholders faster than ever before; but it also eliminates the time that your brand-new card sits unattended in your mailbox – a benefit that eases the minds of many cardholders. For banks, it is also a great way of generating in-branch traffic and maintaining real connections with customers.

As the technology around this offer develops, so too will the service. The next innovation on the horizon is a kiosk model that will bring Smart Instant Issuance to customers both inside and outside the branch setting. This self-serve option can bring banking into new areas such as train stations, airports and malls. So maybe the next time you travel in a foreign country, you can get a local bank card upon arrival. Or if you’re part of the growing online banking population, this option could bring speedy card issuance to a city near you. The sky’s the limit…