- For individuals from Malaysia, Indonesia, China, and Hong Kong
- First Singapore bank to enable digital account opening for foreigners
OCBC has launched a fully digital account opening service for consumers in its key markets relocating to Singapore. Individuals from Malaysia, Indonesia, mainland China and Hong Kong SAR can remotely open Singapore dollar and multi-currency accounts on the OCBC Digital app.
According to OCBC, this expedites the relocation process as a bank account facilitates two other key administrative arrangements – salary crediting and securing accommodation.
Sunny Quek (pic left), OCBC’s Head of Global Consumer Financial Services, said: “By providing them with a seamless and secure way to open an OCBC account, we hope they will be able to get settled and integrate into Singapore life more quickly.”
To fully digitalise this process, OCBC is said to use artificial intelligence, data analytics, biometrics, blockchain and cloud technologies from OneConnect Financial Technology, an associate company of Ping An Group. These technologies have been integrated with OCBC’s proprietary digital know-your-customer process (e-KYC).
According to the Singapore Department of Statistics, from 2021 to 2022, the number of foreigners coming to Singapore to work, study and live grew by 6.6%. As OCBS expects this growth to continue, it predicts the monthly average of foreigners who open an OCBC Singapore bank account in 2024 to be four times that of 2022.
Opening a Singapore bank account will give foreign customers all the features of the OCBC Digital app, including its wealth management services. They will gain access to time deposits, international remittances, unit trusts, single premium endowments, equities trading, foreign exchange trading, robo-investment services, blue-chip stocks and precious metals like gold and silver.
How it works
Malaysia, Indonesia, mainland China and Hong Kong SAR biometric passport holders who plan to relocate to Singapore must first download the Singapore version of the OCBC Digital app to begin the account application and onboarding process. The app is available on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store.
Step 1: Open OCBC Digital app > Tap on ‘Sign up’ > ‘Foreigner with e-passport’
Step 2: Have your passport and ID card ready for digital verification on the app.
After that, the account will be opened, and customers can immediately access the digital, financial and lifestyle services on the OCBC Digital app.