Paul Nyakazeya, Group Digital Editor 
THIS year Standard Chartered Zimbabwe embarked on a digitisation strategy which has seen the country’s oldest bank close down most of its brick and mortar branches across the country. The bank is left with only three physical branches out of 16 it had in 2017.
The Financial Gazette’s Group Digital Editor Paul Nyakazeya (PN) spoke with the bank’s head of retail banking Valeta Mthimkhulu (VM) about the journey and how bank plans to leverage on the growth opportunities offered by digitalisation.
PN: Tell us more about your migration to digital.
VM: Our new digital Bank was launched this year in June. It serves clients without them ever needing to come to our branch if they do not want to, not even to open an account.
It means giving clients the choice to do everything digitally from their mobile phone if they want, but they can also get help via phone, chat, a video link when they want more advice for a big financial decision. We aim to be digital with a human touch.
The digital bank relies on mobile and online technology advancements to provide a convenient, end-to-end digital banking service.
Our new digital bank covers both transaction capability requirements and client queries. All possible scenarios that can bring a client to a branch or contact centre have been migrated to the mobile device for client self-service.
Over 70 services are live including static data changes, card services, bill payment, funds transfer locally and internationally as well as country specific services.
What has also been added is that the client can track and trace a request submitted.
Our USSD platform remains part of our digital channel universe for those clients that prefer it.
Standard Chartered bank’s head of retail banking Valeta Mthimkhulu
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