Gone are the days when you had to make numerous trips to a brick and mortar bank branch even for withdrawing a small amount or transferring money from your account. The new age savings bank account provides you online banking services which is the most convenient way of carrying out your banking needs without visiting the bank branch. Online banking services not only saves time and money it provides immense ease in managing your money.

Today in India, we find ourselves in a thriving digital world where even the street hawkers accepts digital payment without any fuss, a college goer can buy stationery using a debit card or a merchant uses QR code based scan and pay utility.

The wave of digital banking in India makes the life of every citizen of India easy if they start using online banking. Online banking makes everything you do with your money a lot easier. You can access the information anywhere if you have access to the Internet and makes your financial life much easier to manage.

How online banking can help your life easy

Online banking helps you remain paperless and do all you wanted to do with your bank account using the new age internet banking services.The objective of online banking is not only to make banking accessible to all the citizens of the country but also meant to bring the millions who are still unbanked into the financial system as there is no bank branch closer to them.Internet banking services allows these customers to avail banking services on the move through their mobile phones.

The growth of mobile banking has already impacted the banking sector significantly as the mobile banking transactions in India will soon cross 400 million  & would result in cost savings of approximately INR 11 billion (USD230 million) – (Source: IBEF)

These are the few of the many benefits that online bankingoffers you-

You can pay your bills online

Yes, using the online banking, you can pay your utility and other bills. Most of the banks will have a section in which you can set up payees or billers. You will need to fill out the biller information once, and then you can simply choose the biller every time you want to pay him online. You can also set up automatic bill payments for bills for which the amount do not change.

In case your savings account does not provide this facility, you can also pay the biller through debit card by visiting its website using the internet banking services.

This effectively means that you can handle all your online payments without ever going to your bank or without visiting the biller’s bank to deposit the cheque in its favour.

Transfer money online

Online banking also allows you to transfer money between your various accounts using the NEFT/RTGS mechanism. It is more convenient than filling up the transfer form and providing a cheque to your banker for each transfer. When you set up your online banking, be sure that all of the accounts that you have at various banks are listed on the appropriate page. You can also list the accounts of your family members or other beneficiaries with whom you transact frequently.

As you can see, it is much more convenient as you can make transfers 24x7x365 days without leaving your office or home. You can also check the availability of funds before you transfer the money, and therefore, there is no question of cheque bouncing etc.

Set up your ECS payments

Having online banking facility helps you setup regular ECS payments like home loan EMI, mutual Fund SIPs and credit card payments. This ensures that a fixed amount is paid from your account on a fixed date. Therefore,you need not run around to respective institutions to make these payments.

View and download your transactions

Online banking allows you to access your account anytime to see historical transactions from anywhere. This is the quickest way to check all your transactions in real time basis. You can also download your bank statement for a period that you want or for the entire financial year.

If you view your transactions regularly, you get to know the cleared debits and credits daily to  your account and what are the pending transactions and errors, if any.

Pay income tax online and receive the refunds

Having internet banking services helps you pay your annual and advance taxes online. You can also receive the income tax refunds, if any, in your account by providing the account details while filing the income tax return (ITR)

Online banking through mobile app

Most banks nowadays have a mobile app that facilitates online banking on your phone. This is the most convenient way as it allows you to quickly check up your account when you are on move and transact as well. Having the mobile app on your smart phone ensures that you can access information on a secure network provided you have internet on your phone.

In a nutshell, we can say that if you have availed internet banking services from your bank then your bank account is on the move with you. Online banking services makes your life easy as you can fulfill all your banking needs without having to visit the bank branch.

By Kar

Dr. Kar works in the interface of digital transformation and data science. Professionally a professor in one of the top B-Schools of Asia and an alumni of XLRI, he has extensive experience in teaching, training, consultancy and research in reputed institutes. He is a regular contributor of Business Fundas and a frequent author in research platforms. He is widely cited as a researcher. Note: The articles authored in this blog are his personal views and does not reflect that of his affiliations.