State bank of India or SBI, as it is commonly known, is one of India’s leading public sector national bank. It is also the largest public sector bank with many satisfied customers across the country owing to its name and steady services since per-independence era. With time, SBI has also has consistently evolved its way doing of business and has managed to provide financial services to its customers as efficiently as ever. Keeping in line with this tradition, SBI had also introduced SBI Net Banking to fulfil its customer’s requirements and cater to their needs.
Net Banking
With the world moving online, almost everything is operated over the internet. In order to keep up with the times and to ensure that their customers continue to receive the quality services, SBI launched its internet banking facility. Now customers having a bank account with SBI can make financial transactions easily, while sitting in the comfort of their homes or offices provided they need to apply for internet banking facility.
SBI operates its net banking through a highly secured portal called the SBI Online portal. It provides all the online services through this portal to both—its retail clients as well as its corporate clients.
The portal is handled by applications supporting the latest technologies to ensure the online data safety of the clients. SBI net banking has a sophisticated and strong software infrastructure ensuring safety of all the data from across its branches nationwide.
SBI Net Banking in Retail
Basically the retail service is all about one to one dealing of bank with the clients. In other words, retail banking deals with individual clients unlike corporate banking which deals with huge corporate entities. SBI in its retail net banking provides several services to its customers. These services are listed below:
- Permit the customers to transfer funds from one account to another online, without much hassle or a visit to the bank branch.
- SBI net banking also offers its retail customers a host of investment offers and many options to choose from. Offers such as opening deposit accounts of various nature viz. Fixed deposit, recurring deposit or a flexible option. Basically, the job of a bank agent is carried out by SBIOnline portal, thereby making things much easier, both for bank as well as the customers.
- Apart from the investment schemes and fund transfers, SBI net banking also provide its customers the option to book travel tickets online. There is a facility on the net banking portal by which the customers can book flight, train or bus tickets and pay directly via net banking.
- Apart from travel, the net banking also takes care of payments regarding hotel bookings. All you need to do is search for a hotel that suits your budget and book online and make the requisite payment by your net banking ID.
- Net banking also supports online shopping. Simply visit the website, select the things you want to buy and chose SBI net banking as the payment option. You will be directed to the payment window. Follow the directions and you can easily make online payment for your shopping!
- Getting internet data recharge or phone balance recharge is also among many of the services provided by SBI through its net banking.
- You can also transfer instant funds across borders by linking your SBI to Western Union Services. The portal permits transfer of funds online to the Western Union for money transfer to any account outside the country.
- Another essential necessity that consumes the time and energy of an individual is tax filing. SBI offers the option of filing e-taxes via its net banking facilities.
- For those clients who are actively involved in the share market and are on a look out for good investment in the field, SBI net banking offers the DEMAT account and IPO services too.
Apart from the ones categorically mentioned here, there are several other value added services that one may avail on the SBI net banking. The sole purpose of introducing SBI net banking was to make the life of its customers easier.
SBI Net Banking in Corporate
As mentioned earlier, SBI caters to both retail as well as corporate clients. If you are an entrepreneur or a company availing business related services from the bank, the online portal makes these transactions much easier and remotely manageable. It enables you to utilise the time into expanding your business. Some of the key services provided are as under:
- The most pressing need for any corporate client is the ease of access to his or her account from just about anywhere. SBI Net Banking facility will help speed up the monetary transactions which otherwise take far too long. The facility of convenience banking allows the corporate clients an access to their accounts from anywhere, which makes things far easier for the client in the course of making business related transactions.
- Since corporate transactions include large amount of money to be transferred in one go, it is very important to ensure that these transactions are executed securely. For this purpose the State Bank of India make sure that the transactions thus made are absolutely safe and secure.
- SBI provides its corporate customers a 24*7 access to the portal for transactions.
- Just like any other payments, the utility bills and various taxes that a corporate needs to pay are ample. SBI Net Banking ensures a single platform where they can easily make both these payments.
- SBI online provides the facility of uploading the files in case it is required to complete any transaction or payments like tax returns etc.
- There is also the provision of transferring money from one SBI account to another or the intra bank money transfer facility.
- Inter-bank money transfer is also a facility available to the corporate clients, since it is not necessary that the merchant or seller holds an SBI account, thus, a facility of inter-bank transfers is extremely useful.
- Making payments to registered suppliers online is also a facility that SBI provides its corporate clients. This way, they can ensure smooth running of business without worrying about any outstanding payments.
- SBI online banking enables its corporate clients to not only make payments but also collect the same via online banking.
- SBI online also provides the corporate with the option of applying for IPOs online.
Apart from these specifically mentioned services, SBI also provides several value added services to its corporate clients which can be checked out at the website of SBI net banking.
VeriSign Certification
Any online banking service provider caters to a lot of customers and their vital data at any given point of time. Thus, it is very important that the banking portal uses a very secure server to execute the online financial services. The SBI net banking service also enables its customers to execute a wide range of financial transactions on a daily basis. In order to make sure that these crucial and sensitive data are not compromised, SBI offers a high level of security to secure the transactions. The internet transactions are made using an encrypted SSL medium. The EV SSL certificate awarded to SBI as a way of quality assurance in terms of security is a proof that SBI uses highest level of security while enabling its customers to use online portal for financial transactions. This security feature is known as VeriSign and its key security features are listed below:
- VeriSign is believed to be one of the leading internet security certification authorities in the world. This same VeriSign has attested to the security standards adopted by SBI in its online banking portal.
- In order to check, look for the padlock symbol which will either be in the address bar or in the status bar. This symbol is the proof of security certificate. The symbol will always be located within the display area and never out of it.
- When you click on the padlock sign, the symbol will display the certificate of attestation by VeriSign proving that SBI on its end has indeed ensured that the clients’ transactions are completely secure.
Self-Vigilance Guidelines for SBI Net Banking Users
While the bank is doing its share of work in ensuring the safety of online transactions, yet it is always advisable for the clients to be extra careful, since even the slightest carelessness on their end could lead to severe monetary loss to them. After all, despite due diligence, the security measures are still mechanical and are handled by artificial intelligence which can easily be manipulated in the wrong hands. Thus, the bank lays out several guidelines for the users to ensure safety and vigilance on their end. Some of these guidelines are as under:
- Customers should never share their password with anyone. Always remember that the bank will never ask for their customer’s password.
- It is always wise to keep changing them at various intervals which makes it difficult for anyone to hack it.
- Try to have a password that makes use of variations such as upper case letters, lower case letters, numbers and special symbols. The tougher the password combination, the harder it is for someone to crack it.
The Bank on its part ensures that all safety measures are adopted, but given the advancement of technologies, it is not hard to fathom that someone might find a way around these safeguards. For this purpose, it is strongly advised to the customers to adhere to these safety guidelines while operating the SBI net banking portal. Although, SBI on its part attempts to make timely updates in the software to make sure that there are no malfunctions. As long as the customer is vigilant about not sharing sensitive data with anyone, online banking is a secure medium for making any kinds of financial transactions without any trouble.