Digital skills at yearly verification

Kamal Baruah

(kamal.baruah@yahoo.com)

Digital skills are indeed necessary for everyone in today's world. Toe the line with the computer; one just can't press the Escape button always to return to the main menu. It is usual while people accept the way of doing things through UPI or Unified payments interface such as G-payUPI - the mobile payment method has earned gigantic popularity for its user-friendly interface, and surprisingly they are able to do it with ease."Upgrade your digital skills or perish". Digital is the new mantra for online activities and senior citizen, especially pensioners, can't get escape from it.

For this November, pensioners have been on the go all these days for annual verification. Every Central government, defence, state, Public Sector Undertakings or other pensioner is to submit annual Life Certificate during this month for further continuation of monthly pension. A large number of pensioners physically visit Pension Disbursing Agencies (PDAs) such as bank, post office, LIC, EPFO or treasury for this purpose. Senior citizens find it hard to be physically present owing to old age and infirmity. Also, there is a long queue of pensioners at major branches during submission. In view of the above, steps are taken by banks to make this process easier, while pensioners and their care-givers are uninformed of it.

A Life Certificate can be submitted manually or digitally which is recorded by a Pension Disbursing Agency. A pensioner may appear physically. To enable an additional exclusive window, government allow pensioners can submit from home through Jeevan Pramaan portal by facilitating Aadhaar-enabled biometric authentication to generate Digital Life Certificate. Public sector bank alliances have also introduced Doorstep Banking (DSB) service under ease of banking reforms. Service can be booked through its app or website. Besides, State Bank of India has also launched a Pension Seva Portal to facilitate Video Life Certificate (VLC) for regular as well as family pensioners.

Digital platforms contain so much facility for pensioners to submit life certificate, yet many find it difficult to follow it and they rush to banks for submission. As the number of pensioners swelled at banks, officials faced a tough time handling the situation. Besides all queues and waiting time, they won't mind if they are late because they are exploring every avenue to meet their friends after a long time. The entire show is other than the fact that tea and biscuits highlighted their day in this November.

This occasion is a unique opportunity for banks to market their products for needy customers and at the same time, customers gain experience from financial literacy to preventive vigilance, frauds and security measures at banks. Today's banking is going through tremendous changes from digital banking to mobile solutions. Just slide your finger on the screen, and one can see the magic in another world with your smartphone. This is not just balance enquiry to mini statement from WhatsApp banking, but there are other apps and Internet banking platforms that allow all transactions 24x7 with 128-bit SSL encryption technology.

With the increased number of transactions happening through UPI, there has been a significant rise in the case of bank frauds due to digital engineering. There have been numerous reports of hoaxes and tricksters swindling consumers through online financial attacks, UPI frauds, hacking, cyber-crimes, and other financial hazards. Yet people share OTP with unknown senders such as scamsters, fraudsters and hackers. The slightest error can have serious consequences. That is really scary as people have been doing rather foolishly under tense situation.

Fake URLs in the form of SMS, unverified app, fake calls, phishing e-mail attachments or unprotected websites are all around. Online transaction is a blessing for customers that ease the burden on both the bankers and the customers to avail day-to-day transactions. No longer do senior citizens have to wait in unending queues to carry out trivial monetary transactions. They can make use of these services with limited Internet access. Let's explore the exciting times of hassle-free experience to the end consumers during this yearly verification.