Nigerian Banking Apps: AccessMore vs GTWorld, which one has better features?
Mobile apps have become essential tools for banking in the current digital world. Today, every bank in Nigeria has more than one mobile app, all trying to make banking easier, fast, and more convenient for their customers.
The use of apps has drastically reduced visits to banking halls by many Nigerians as bank customers can make transfers and pay bills of any kind and also make complaints and get their issues resolved via the apps. Some of these apps also come with upgraded features that allow users to request ATM cards and chequebooks.
However, customer experience on these apps is anything but perfect. While the apps meet customers’ expectations in some areas, they are faltering in many other areas.
This is why Nairametrics is taking a look at the mobile apps of two of the leading new-generation banks in Nigeria; Access Bank and GTBank. While the two banks have more than one app through which they serve their customers, AccessMore and GTWorld are the most prominent for these financial institutions.
What are the features of these apps? How have they fared in terms of size, number of downloads, reviews, and user experience? What are the users saying? These and many more questions will be answered as we review these apps.
News continues after this ad
News continues after this ad
AccessMore’s features: Aside from its stylish and beautiful design, the AccessMore app, which is an upgrade to the regular Access Bank Mobile app, has a lovely user interface to complement its easy navigation menu.
Its features include quick account opening, personalized theme and colour scheme, single click to all favourite features, self QR generation for intra-bank transfers, scan QR for payments, investment services and PayDay Loan.
The app also allows Dubai Visa applications and the purchase of movie tickets. It also provides simplified foreign currency transfer service, airtime top-up and utility bills payments, cheque services (new chequebook request, stop and confirm cheque), and card services (new debit card request, card block and unblock).
The app comes with a unique fingerprint authentication as an added security feature. Users of this app do not need a token to perform online transactions. The mobile app also provides a live chat feature that enables customers to get help at any point when they encounter difficulties. It is a stress-free app that makes the customer feel at home. For example, one can order a fresh chequebook via the app without going physically to the bank.
GTWorld’s features: Similarly, GTB’s GTWorld mobile app has a beautiful orange background design that makes it enticing and cool for the user to navigate and experience the unique features that the app brings. Log in is simple, as it requires just your internet banking ID and password.
Built on the back of the bank’s customer-centric digital strategy, GTWorld also features biometric authentication, such as facial recognition and fingerprint, which recognizes a customer and adapts to how and when they want to bank.
The Mobile banking app has a seamless switch to GAPS Lite, the online banking platform for small businesses which offers a flexible and secure channel to make payments and collections anywhere in the world.
Once you successfully log in to the app, you can view all your accounts (savings, current, fixed deposit, domiciliary) and carry out other transactions like fund transfers, buying airtimes, and checking the daily history of transactions.
The Downloads: While the Apple Store does not show the number of downloads on an app on the platform, Google Play Store shows that both AccessMore and GTworld are equal when it comes to the number of times the apps have been downloaded. Both apps have recorded 1 million plus downloads on Google Play Store.
The Ratings: Based on users’ experience, AccessMore is rated 4.5 out of 5 on the Google Play Store, while its rating on the Apple Store stood at 4.8. GTWorld on the other hand is rated 3.8 on the Google Play Store and 3.2 on the Apple Store. This shows that AccessMore is rated better on both platforms.
Number of Reviews: In terms of the number of reviews, AccessMore is also doing better compared with GTworld. On Google Play Store, the app has recorded 202,000 reviews, while it has had 46, 683 on the Apple Store. For GTWorld, the number of its Play Store reviews was 22,000, while on the Apple Store it had recorded only 381 reviews.
Language preference: This feature, which gives users a choice of language for an app is available only on the Apple Store, and the higher the number of languages available for an app, the better for its users. A look at the two apps shows that AccessMore is also better in this regard as it features 21 languages. GTWorld on the other hand features 9 languages.
The apps’ sizes: One major challenge for mobile users is memory space, especially the Random Access Memory (RAM) which houses all apps on a phone. A heavy-sized app occupies a lot of space on the users’ phones and may not function optimally if the user does not have enough memory, which is why the lighter an app comes, the better.
Comparing the two banking apps, GTWorld is better in this regard as it is the lighter of the two. On Google Play Store, the app is 49MB, while it is 76MB on the Apple Store. AccessMore app comes heavier and will occupy more space on the users’ phones. The app is 54MB on Google Play Store and 285.6MB on Apple Store.
Users’ experiences: Users of the apps are having a mix of positive and negative experiences. We have highlighted users’ reviews below.
AccessMore Users: Robinson Samuel’s experience on the has been good and according to him, the app is great and ticks many boxes but can be better in a few areas. He said:
“Beautiful user interface and experience. Not too chunky, not too loose. But the app has issues with fingerprint unlock, as it takes about a minute before responding only on this app. Regardless it’s the best.”
For Emmanuel Kadiri, the app’s UI and design are its greatest assets, while its performance is poor. He said:
“I love the app’s beautiful design, superb UI, perfect arrangement, and great innovation, but its performance is extremely poor. Thank God I had kept the old app handy all the while. Once this AccessMore app starts its usual misbehaviour, I just quickly move to the old one, and my transaction is done immediately. Now the old app seems not to be working again as I tried unlocking it on my new device and it kept telling me I have inserted the wrong account number. So I have to stick to this one without an option.”
Olatunbosun Oyediran believes the app’s user interface, though beautiful, is not user-friendly, especially for older users. He said:
“The interface is nice and colourful, but it’s not simple enough for elderly people to understand. Not the bank’s customers are youths and teens. I opened an Access Bank account and it’s active and functional, I have my card and USSD banking is working perfectly but the AccessMore app is just useless on my phone. I can’t even see my account balance in the menu section let alone make transfers. When I want to carry out a transfer it shows no account. And I’ve linked my card and everything.”
GTWorld users: A GTWorld user, Jean E. is disappointed that he is unable to save some details for repetitive transactions on the app. He said:
“I downloaded the app only a few days back, however, I didn’t see much difference from d previous one. I was hoping for an additional page to save my electricity meter number, my cable tv number, my mobile number for top-ups, etc so that I don’t have to complete those each time I wish to make a payment but check them out as saved beneficiaries. This is not an improvement to me.”
For Mohammed Bello, though he loves the user interface of the app, however, his inability to view transactions on a linked prepaid dollar card is a letdown. He said:
“Nice interface. But, sadly, one cannot view transactions made on a linked prepaid dollar card. You can’t request statements of account for a linked prepaid dollar card. You can only do that for your main bank account.”
Johnson Olayemi is also pleased with the app’s interface but feels disappointed about the glitches he experienced during transfers.
“The app’s interface is good but errors like ‘can’t retrieve account details’ when transferring to another bank occurs repeatedly. The app takes time to load up and also takes longer to initiate transactions. To carry out a transaction shouldn’t take more than 2 minutes if it was built to solve a problem,” he said.
Expert’s opinion: The Founder SalesUltimo, a chatbot and social media marketing Software as a service, Mr Bello Muritala, who uses the two apps, said though the apps are not perfect, they are easing banking transactions for the users and could be better with updates.
“From the perspective of a software person that I am, the apps are not bad, though they could be better. I have an account in the two banks and I use their apps. There are times you carry out your transactions smoothly and seamlessly and there are times you experience glitches.
The fact is that every software developer is trying to solve a problem and will not rest until such a problem is solved. The banks’ engineers are more constrained to fix every problem on the apps they put out there for customers; they keep working to fix bugs and make the experience better and that is why they keep coming up with new updates,” he said.
Bottom line: Despite some users’ complaints, both the AccessMore and GTWorld apps are great. However, there’s always room for improvement, which is why continuous updating is necessary. It must also be noted that sometimes, several other factors outside the app affect users’ quality of experience, and these range from phone memory to the quality of the internet connection being used for the transaction.
Related
Curated from: https://nairametrics.com/2022/12/20/nigerian-banking-apps-accessmore-vs-gtworld-which-one-has-better-features/
TAGS: #Nigerian #Banking #Apps #AccessMore #GTWorld #features
Leave a Reply