When it comes to checking Officially Valid Documents (OVDs) and verifying KYC information, the maker-checker concept has been in place for a long time. However, due to the accelerated pace of digital transformation catalysed by the pandemic, the manual process of this maker-checker activity has started becoming more expensive and hence unviable.

That being said, the process of submission of documents can never be dispensed with, especially in customer-intensive sectors like Banking, Insurance and Telecom where accurate identity verification takes centerstage due to various regulatory mandates.

Here’s how the current OVD upload and KYC data verification process looks like:

1. The customer submits or uploads the required ID documents.

2. Any parity or omission is recorded as a mismatch and either rejected, or the customer is asked to resubmit the documents as a post-facto process.

3. The uploaded documents are manually checked for visual clarity and the KYC information is retrieved, digitised and verified manually.

4. Post verification, the KYC information is manually recorded and stored in the company’s backend systems along with a digital copy of the submitted OVD.

Although tedious, this process is followed by companies to obtain a comprehensive understanding of who they are serving and to align with various regulatory guidelines.

However, the above process of making and checking is fraught with three key challenges:

 1. High Probability of Error

Manual verification and manual data entry mean that all the information uploaded in the system is routed through human intervention. Given the sheer quantum of customers, the chances of incorrect verification of the document and the entry of the wrong details open up the enterprise to regulatory scrutiny and repeated errors can lead to a cascading effect. 

2. Sub-optimal Utilisation of Manpower

For verifying the OVD and recording the KYC information, organisations need to allocate dedicated frontend and backend teams that receive, verify and process the documents of every single customer. This not only results in massive manpower costs but also presents diverse challenges that are common with most manual processes. 

3. Significant Time Investment

With every single customer document undergoing manual verification, the turnaround time (TAT) to complete the verification process is significantly high. This not only results in higher operational costs but also slows down the customer acquisition cycle that often leads to a poor customer experience.

Introducing Automated ID Information Retrieval

Putting the aforementioned three challenges into perspective, ECS has developed a robust Automated ID Information Retrieval (AIIR) solution that instantly identifies the type of KYC document, verifies the same and auto-populates the requisite customer KYC data without any manual intervention.

The solution harnesses the power of ECS’s next-gen AI engine that is pre-programmed with comprehensive guidelines for accurate real-time document identification, information verification and data extraction.

Key Functionalities:

1. Instant document identification

2. Automatic validation and retrieval of KYC data

3. Capturing of the live location and address of the customer

4. Processing of Face Authentication (Face Auth)  and liveness check

5. Auto generation of filled Customer Acquisition Form (CAF) / Account Opening Form

1. Instant Document Identification

The AIIR solution automatically identifies the type of the uploaded document by instantly comparing it with the unique document properties preset in the backend AI engine. 

2. Automatic Validation of KYC Data

Whether it is an Aadhaar Card, PAN Card, Driving License or Passport, the uploaded document undergoes the following identification process in the AIIR solution:

• Images, machine-readable zones (passports, some national IDs), or custom text zones are extracted.
• Rules such as MRZ Code Check, Missing Zones and DoB verification are applied to the extracted data.
• The data retrieved from the physical copy of the document is digitised and stored in the backend database of the AIIR platform.
• The AIIR platform can then invoke the online APIs of the OVD issuer to fetch the KYC data from the OVD issuer.
• Data extracted from the OVD copy can then be matched / compared with the data received from the backend API of the OVD issuer and a data match score can be generated.
• Upon a match, data is either stored at the client host or passed on to the next integrated solution.

3. Live Location and Address Capturing

The AIIR solution captures the latitude-longitude coordinates of the customer’s physical location and retrieves the address by using reverse geo-coding technology

4. Face Auth and Liveness Check

The AIIR solution captures the customer’s live photograph and a Face Auth and liveness check transaction is executed to compare this live photo with the photo extracted from the OVD copy.

The digitised process cuts short the administrative costs and the processing time by automating the verification cycle.

• A human face is identified from within a defined image
• Customer liveness is detected based on scoring and a comparison of images
• The OVD is auto-approved or rejected depending on the pre-defined review threshold.

5. Auto Generation of Filled CAF 

Solving the age-old task of manually filling each field in the Customer Acquisition Form (CAF)  platform, the AIIR solution facilitates customised auto-insertion of specific data that needs to be recorded in the CAF.

The AIIR solution digitises the existing CAF / Account Opening Form and dynamically auto-inserts the extracted / entered data in the appropriate fields. The generation of a pre-filled CAF / Account Opening Form is the logical culmination of the KYC transaction as the entire process gets completed in a paperless and automated manner.

By dispensing the human subjectivity in KYC, information verification and data processing tasks, the AIIR solution delivers a foolproof, super-efficient, paperless customer onboarding mechanism that not only saves significant manpower costs but also eliminates errors and long TATs.

To learn more about ECS’s Automated ID Information Retrieval (AIIR) solution, please feel free to get in touch with our colleague Andrica Dmello on andrica@eastcs.com.