Top FinTech Priorities for Financial Institutions in 2024

Community financial institutions (CFIs) are investing in several key areas for 2024-2025. While every bank and credit union would love to increase AUM and NIM, those are broad goals that require strategic improvements across the organization. These days, such advances are driven largely by technology decisions. Here is an overview of how CFI leaders are planning to invest for greater success.

Banks and Credit Unions Are Increasing Tech Spend

According to findings from Jack Henry’s sixth annual survey of bank and credit union CEOs, 37% of credit unions are planning to boost their tech investment budget 6-10%. 30% of banks intend to do the same. 

This trend will lead to increased activity in sourcing the ideal FinTech partners to drive digital innovation. Such decisions require a great deal of due diligence, especially for smaller CFIs that need a responsive partner. Get advice on selecting a FinTech partner here. 

Fraud Prevention Is the #1 Investment Area for Financial Institutions 

According to the Jack Henry research, “Fraudsters and cybercriminals continue to fortify their arsenal, leveraging new tools like GenAI, deep fakes, and a wealth of stolen Personal Identifiable Information (PII) from numerous data breaches to defraud both consumers and financial institutions at an accelerated rate…Strategic investments in advanced technology geared toward identity will become imperative for banks and credit unions looking to protect themselves and their account holders.”

It’s no surprise that fraud is the leading technology investment planned for 2024 and 2025. Account takeovers remain one of the top threats facing financial institutions. Every account that is impacted can result not only in financial losses, but harm to brand reputation and reduced trust among customers and members. 

The contact center remains a prime target for this type of fraud. To learn ways to prevent account takeovers in banking call centers, go here. 

Social engineering is the most significant cybersecurity concern across financial institutions. This isn’t surprising given the vast amount of information that is now publicly available about the average consumer. Fraudsters routinely leverage this data to trick their way into account access. 

However, both banks and credit unions pointed toward an even more troubling threat this year: social engineering of employees. If hackers gain access to banking IT infrastructure through social engineering, stolen credentials, “vishing” and other tactics, this can result in major data breaches and ransomware scenarios with far reaching consequences. 

Learn more about a potential way to protect the helpdesk call center from potential identity fraud involving internal employees. 

Accountholder Experience Is a Common Focus

Forrester’s 2024 Planning Guide points to the call center as an area of significant investment for CX leaders in the U.S. 59% of those surveyed plan to invest in more technology, and 48% specifically point to increased spending on contact center technologies that improve customer experience. 

34% of credit unions and 23% of banks list improving accountholder experience as an area of critical investment for 2024. While AI has the potential to improve personalization and customer/member journeys, digital banking as a whole has created some challenges in maintaining an excellent experience. 

According to recent research from Accenture, “By shifting customer engagement out of the branch and onto their digital channels, banks’ experiences have become functionally correct but emotionally void. And at the same time as their personal connection with customers has weakened, so has banks’ ability to differentiate themselves: Accenture’s Life Trends 2024 survey found that 42% of consumers find it hard to distinguish between financial services brands.”

There is a middle ground between experience in the branch vs. self-service through a digital interface. The contact center stands at the intersection of convenience and personal connection for most of today’s financial consumers. Voice authentication is one example of how the warmth of the in-branch experience can be extended into other channels using technology to eliminate repetitive and uncomfortable authentication processes. 

How do consumers feel about voice biometrics? Read here to find out.

Operational Efficiency a Top 3 Priority Across CFIs

In 2024, banks have operational efficiency as their 2nd highest priority. For credit unions, the urgency of improving efficiency landed at number three. This is an interesting finding since recent research from McKinsey & Company found that credit unions lag behind banks significantly in terms of expense control. Those that find ways to improve efficiency without sacrificing member experience will be more competitive and likely to reach their profitability goals with greater predictability.

See how one credit union targeted the call center for operational improvements using voice authentication software to save 1400+ FTE Hours in the first 6 months. Read Case Study.

How Can Voice Authentication from Illuma Help?

One of the reasons Illuma Shield™ voice verification has seen strong adoption over the past several years is that it addresses several top concerns simultaneously. 

1. Fraud prevention has always been the most critical benefit of voice biometrics. This has become even more critical in the era of voice cloning and vishing where the ability of the human ear to distinguish between real and synthetic voices simply can’t keep up with advancements in generative AI. 

2. Caller experience is an equally important area of improvement. Voice biometrics replace outdated and time consuming KBA, resulting in a truly frictionless experience in the contact center channel. Agents are able to put their full focus on addressing the reason for the accountholder’s call instead of creating obstacles through security Q&A. 

3. Operational efficiency is the final piece of the puzzle, with voice authentication software routinely reducing the time spent verification by 85% or more. The ROI from an efficiency standpoint alone is a strong argument for making voice verification an early step in the digital transformation journey.

Want to see what makes our solution affordable and easy to deploy? Book a demo today.