Bangladesh Bank issued a circular on guidelines for ‘Electronic Know Your Customer (e-KYC)’ on Wednesday introducing the system.

The e-KYC guidelines said if anybody wants to open a bank account or beneficiary owner (BO) account or insurance policy, he/she does not need to go to the bank or office concerned physically for this.

“Rather, he/she can open the account following five steps in five minutes under the e-KYC,” said the circular issued Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) of the central bank.

It said through this system, Bangladesh will move further in its efforts to ensure financial inclusion while things will be easier and the expenditure of a bank client or service seeker will be reduced.

Bangladesh Bank also mentioned that any person who has the national ID card can open the account in five minutes while the cost for opening account will come down by 50-80 percent.

The e-KYC will help the government achieve the Vision 2021 and its aim to build a digital Bangladesh while good governance, growth in financial inclusion and prevention of money-laundering will also be ensured.

The central bank also said under the e-KYC, any person can open bank account by his or her physical presence in bank or a representative of bank or financial institution can go to a client’s residence or client can himself or herself open the account from his own house without going to bank.  

Nineteen banks and one mobile financial service provider ran pilot projects in 55 locations under 33 districts in this regard before introduction of the system.

“The e-KYC was formulated in light of their experiences and recommendations,” said the circular.