AI virtual assistants making banking easier for everyday consumers

The rise of mobile banking in the last few years has coincided with the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) becoming more capable and pervasive in a variety of fields and applications. Although unrelated, the parallel growth in both the sectors has, of course, led to a confluence of the two, as more and more banking and finance institutions explore AI applications to improve their offerings and services. While enterprise-solutions are many – from more efficient data analytics to improved back-end workflows through automation – quite a few organisations have also explored consumer-facing applications of AI. One of the most widely adopted applications has been the consumer chat-assistant. Simply put, a chat assistant (colloquially called a chatbot) is an AI or computer programme that conducts conversations meant to replicate human conversation via auditory or textual means.