Role of Mobile Banking in Banking Sector in The Present ERA

Mobile banking is a revolution that is driven by the world’s one of the fastest growing sectors – mobile communication technology. This study explores the issues in mobile banking perceived critical for adoption by both mobile banking users as well as non-users. With electronic banking, users can now conveniently carry out banking transactions, but this convenience cannot be achieved if the user does not have access to the internet, hence, in other words, the user cannot carry out a banking transaction while waiting for a bus, or perhaps while having lunch in a restaurant. With m-banking, convenience can be achieved 24hrs a day. This is because a user has access to his mobile phone all day, at all times. So, to effectively achieve a truly convenient banking mode, a truly mobile mode of banking has to be explored, hence the need for m-banking. In the broader sense mobile banking is that type of execution of financial services in the course of which - within an electronic procedure - the customer uses mobile communication techniques in conjunction with mobile devices. Mobile Banking can be said to consist of three inter-related concepts viz. Mobile Accounting, Mobile Bro-kerage and Mobile Financial Information. Mobile Banking is an emerging alternate channel for providing banking services. India is the second largest telecom market in the world, which is having high potential for expanding banking services using mobile. In recent times, the Banking Sector has been making rapid straights by using information technology as a platform and endeavoring to scale higher heights. An attempt has been made in this paper to examine various innovative instruments that have been introduced by Banks in recent times among that mobile banking is one instrument and also explains about what are the recent trends in mobile banking.


INTRODUCTION
The terms Mobile Phone banking and mobile banking (M-Banking) are used interchangeably. The term M-Banking is used to denote the access to banking services and facilities offered by financial institutions such as account-based savings, payment transactions and other products by use of an electronic mobile device. Mobile banking has yielded a multiple effect on the number of solutions available to clients. This is in addition to more efficient transactional environment and the high substitution of banking points.
In the broader sense mobile banking is that type of execution of financial services in the course of which -within an electronic procedure -the customer uses mobile communication techniques in conjunction with mobile devices. Mobile Banking can be said to consist of three inter-related concepts viz. Mobile Accounting, Mobile Brokerage and Mobile Financial Information. Mobile Accounting is sometimes characterized as transaction-based banking services that revolve around a bank account and are availed using mobile devices. Not all Mobile Accounting services are however necessarily transaction-based. Whereas Mobile Brokerage, in context of banking services, refers to intermediary services related to the bourse, e.g. selling and purchasing of stocks. Mobile Brokerage can be thus defined as transaction based mobile financial services of non-informational nature that revolve around a securities account. Mobile financial information refers to non-transaction based banking and financial services of informational nature. It includes subsets from both banking and financial services and is meant to provide the customer with anytime, anywhere access to information. The information may either concern the bank and securities accounts of the customer or it may be regarding market developments with relevance for that individual customer. The information may be customized on the basis of preferences given by the customer and sent with a frequency decided by him.

TRENDS IN MOBILE BANKING
1. The advent of the Internet has revolutionized the way the financial services industry conducts business, empowering organizations with new business models and new ways to offer 24 hour accessibility to their customers. 2. The ability to offer financial transactions online has also created new players in the financial services industry, such as online banks, online brokers and wealth managers who offer personalized services, although such players still account for a tiny percentage of the industry. 3. Over the last few years, the mobile and wireless market has been one of the fastest growing markets in the world and it is still growing at a rapid pace. According to the GSM Association and Ovum, the number of mobile subscribers exceeded 2 billion in September 2005, and now exceeds 2.5 billion (of which more than 2 billion are GSM). 4. Mobile devices, especially smart phones, are the most promising way to reach the masses and to create "stickiness" among current customers, due to their ability to provide services anytime, anywhere, high rate of penetration and potential to grow. According to Gartner, shipment of smart phones is growing fast, and should top 20 million units (of over 800 million sold) in 2006 alone.

ReseaRch PaPeR
5. As the trend is shifting to mobile banking, there is a challenge for CIOs and CTOs of these banks to decide on how to leverage their investment in internet banking and offer mobile banking, in the shortest possible time. 6. The proliferation of the 3G (third generation of wireless) and widespread implementation expected for 2007-2013 will generate the development of more sophisticated services such as multimedia and links to m-commerce services.

MOBILE BANKING IN INDIA
In India, traditional branch-based banking remains the most widely adopted method of conducting banking transaction, at the same time commercial banks are undergoing a rapid change majorly driven by the information & telecommunication (ITC) technology. ICICI bank pioneered in mobile banking services in India. Among public banks, Union Bank of India was first to introduce mobile banking (2010). Today many commercial banks have launched mobile banking using ITC technology and now they can reach out to customers and provide them with not only general information about its services but also the opportunity of performing interactive retail banking transactions anytime, anywhere. Laundering (AML)‖ as prescribed by RBI from time to time would be applicable to customers opting for mobile based banking service.

A. Transaction Limits in Mobile Banking
 Only Indian rupee transactions and these transactions are allowed within India only.  Per day transaction cap of Rs.50000 has been removed by RBI, and every bank can change this cap depending upon their risk.  Transactions without end-to-end encryption is Rs.5000/-(SMS Based).

B. Security and Authentication
The highlights of security and authentication guidelines provided by the RBI on Mobile Banking:  The mPIN or higher standard of mechanism should be used to authenticate the Mobile Banking customer.  End-to-end secure encryption mechanism should be followed in transactions  Bank should conduct regular information security audits on the mobile banking systems to ensure complete security.

MOBILE BANKING IN THE WORLD
Mobile banking is used in many parts of the world with an exception of remote and rural areas with little or no infrastructure. This aspect is also popular in countries where most of their population is unbanked. In most of these places, banks can only be found in big cities, and customers have to journey hundreds of miles to the nearest bank. With the advent of technology and increasing use of smartphone and tablet based devices, the use of Mobile Banking functionality would enable customer connect across entire customer life cycle much comprehensively than before.
With this scenario, current mobile banking objectives of say building relationships, reducing cost, achieving new revenue stream will transform to enable new objectives targeting higher level goals such as building brand of the banking organization.

CONCLUSIONS
 Though M-banking seems to cut across all groups, usage is more pronounced among youngsters.  With the help of mobile banking users can send money using their phone to any other customer in the country, deposits and withdrawals in less time.  According to the country Mobile banking provides financial services, including solutions facilitating savings and insurance.  Mobile Banking facilitates payments, giving users a way to pay their bills and to pay for goods at shops that accept Orange Money electronically without cash.  Mobile Banking, as has been demonstrated, has gained non-negligible relevance for banks today. Developments in the banking sector, e.g. increased competition on account of technological developments coupled with the process of globalization have produced new challenges for banks. Its main contribution, however, can be expected to take place in the strategic field as it is all set to become an instrument of differentiation.  Mobile Banking seems to possess the potential to become one of the widely spread and accepted application in the field of Mobile Commerce, particularly in the backdrop of its high acceptance across commercially important sections of the society. We may expect to see Mobile Banking go into the footsteps of Online Banking, i.e. to become a standard service offered by every bank worth its name. Hence, the future for banking sector is going to make rapid straights in near future.  One of the draw back in Mobile Banking is most of the customers feel comfortable without mobile banking. They also feel, there are chances of misuse in mobile banking due to mobile handset theft.