Financial services companies are discovering that artificial intelligence can do more than save them time — it can enhance the customer experience. Using data extraction to automate routine tasks isn't the end game, it's just the beginning.  Across the financial sector, AI is getting to work. It's saving companies a fortune by automating routine tasks as well as strengthening their data governance and ingeniously hiding and retrieving sensitive ID information buried within large archives. But another area with vast potential is data extraction, a process where AI uses optical character recognition (OCR) to identify specific data points within layers of text. Put simply, algorithms spot patterns in documents and collect key information that might have taken hours to locate manually. The possibilities are endless. Virtually any business document follows some kind of format and has standard data points. It could be an identity record, appraisal report, or a sales contract. Where important data points exist, AI will find them. In financial services, around 90% of standard work processes can be automated with data extraction playing its part. Staff only need to handle the 10 percent of exceptions that require some human help. In a recent project, our customer faced the challenge of having to identify crucial customer data scattered over 25.000 customer files and 2 million documents. With the aid of artificial intelligence, we extracted this information with an accuracy of 95%.  Hence freeing up our customer’s employees for value-added tasks, such as focusing on customer care. That's a huge win in itself. But there's far more you can do with data extraction. In fact, it presents a major opportunity to enrich your product offering. Making interactions personal Data extraction has a second application: It can populate your other company systems automatically and then be used to transform the customer experience. Right now, we're working with a financial services client on a project where we extract data from their DMS archive and then import it directly into their ERP system. The ability to extract an individual's identity data automatically from documents — such as first names and birth dates — means the company's customer service can now be more relevant and personal. Extracted data can also support each customer touchpoint. As an example, let's take a request for payment from a kitchen supplier. Financial services companies can use AI to extract key data from the invoice, locating and validating the firm's VAT details and business registration number. As a result, the customer can safely transfer funds from their account. Fraud checks happen before the transaction, not afterwards. These are just a few examples. But the potential is immense for financial services companies. Once the extracted data is in your CRM or another core system, you can use AI to engage better with customers throughout their journeys, based on context, timing, and a host of other factors. Discover more If you want to accelerate your business processes, save hours of staff time, and improve the customer experience — all at once — then data extraction is the way to go. Get in touch today and our experienced team will be delighted to explore the possibilities with you. There's far more to artificial intelligence than meets the eye.

Do you want to focus more on driving innovation — and spend less time trying to prevent data compliance breaches and fines? Now, breakthrough tech can prove a game-changer for financial services companies across the UK, Germany, and the rest of Europe. Whatever the post-COVID-19 world looks like, managing sensitive data will be part of any 'new normal' for financial services companies. But it's a task that's getting tougher. Every week, it can seem like new regulations are arriving from local, European or global regulators. Companies are grappling with complexity — from the far-reaching ramifications of GDPR, to Bank Secrecy Act/Anti-Money Laundering requirements from the US. Across the world, there are swift moves to target money laundering, tackle the financing of terrorism, and impose sanctions on oligarchs and their network of companies. The pressure is ramping up on financial services companies. The risk of compliance breaches, fines, and damage to brands has never been so severe. But, at the same time, companies are having to comb through an expanding quagmire of unstructured data across multiple systems and silos. So how can you free yourself from this draining scenario — and focus instead on finding fresh ways to sharpen your competitive edge? Using AI to strengthen governance It's an uncomfortable truth, but many archives today have grown so large and complex that it's now impossible for humans to monitor compliance and get any sense of 'who their customers are'. But artificial intelligence can be used to fully automate the process, even if you're grappling with millions of documents. For example, what happens when personal ID information is needed for transactions and processes — but the same data cannot be text-searchable? While optical character recognition (OCR) is nothing new, the latest AI engines have improved accuracy and speed remarkably through machine learning. New tech can blur ID data automatically while leaving the integrity of the archive intact. It's proving an invaluable way to strike that perfect balance between privacy and verification. Quality control is a great place to start. New AI tools for data integrity will let you dive into any new, historical, and unstructured customer documents — across different repositories, so you can get a unified approach that protects your entire business. Very quickly, you can scan huge amounts of data for completeness, remove information that shouldn't be there, and check documents are stored in the correct customer file. As a result, it's far simpler to ensure the data complies with legislation. Next comes customer due diligence. Here, AI saves hours of human effort in an extremely sensitive area. You can analyze vast volumes of data, start to know the customer better, and spot files where critical data is missing. By recognizing unusual behavior, the AI can flag up heightened risk profiles and potentially suspicious transactions. Finance companies can be the first to know — not the last. Discover more As countries emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic, financial companies need to be more resilient, positive and innovative. So, rather than viewing data compliance as a necessary evil, see it as the door to something greater. With the right tools and techniques, you can adapt to regulatory change faster. But you can also accelerate your digital transformation process and gain an advantage in your marketplace — by becoming a more insightful and agile organization. If you want to focus more on driving innovation, then get in touch. Our experienced team will be delighted to explore your data governance challenges and find smart ways to strengthen their privacy.

“Some organisations use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to blur personal information within their archives. Others use AI to retrieve ID information from scanned passports and ID cards, in order to enrich their databases.” This month in AI on the road, Krijn talks about the dual use of AI in processing passports and ID cards. In the column “AI on the road”, Hyarchis Artificial Intelligence expert Krijn talks about the AI-related questions that he encounters during meetings with clients. In other words, very basic questions and answers about this seemingly complex topic. This month Krijn focuses on the use of AI for managing sensitive passport- and ID-card-related data within large archives. Krijn, let’s start with using AI to remove ID information. What questions do you encounter?The questions that arise around removing ID information, or better said: making that information inaccessible, are often based on compliance with GDPR legislation. Various organisations are burdened with large archives containing millions of copies of passports and ID cards. Under the current regulation, it is important that access to sensitive data, such as personal identification numbers (PINs), is restricted. AI offers the possibility to do this while leaving the integrity of the archive intact. The Dutch website InFinance recently published an article on the subject, in which they outlined how to correctly process PINs in line with the regulations of the Dutch Data Protection Authority (Dutch: Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens). AI gives organisations the ability to track down personal identification numbers in documents which are not text-searchable. As a result, organisations can find and subsequently hide sensitive data in an automated manner even in outdated or complex archives. Could you give an example of information that organisations need to blur?Before GDPR came in effect, the PIN of someone who was applying for example a mortgage was recorded and saved in this file. Under current legislation, PINs are not to be disclosed in a this application, unless this is essential to the purpose for which the data is processed. Only when the contract is actually signed, the personal identification number can be recorded and included in the case file. Because of this, many organisations are now wondering “How do I make this number inaccessible?” What role does AI play in all of this?It is impossible to manually remove specific information from scanned passports and ID cards. Passports might be scanned horizontally, vertically, crooked, or two scans could be even combined on one page. Add the wide variety of layouts – every country has their own passport design – and you start to understand the magnitude of this challenge. Step one is automation. However, what do you do if not only the search process has many variables, but the blurring process too? That is where AI comes into play. Using OCR-based technology, our software solutions recognise personal identification numbers within scanned documents with a near 100 percent accuracy. Once found, AI makes sure that these numbers are blurred, making them unrecognisable. What is the difficulty that you address by using AI?It is often unknown where the files containing passports and ID cards are located. Most of the time the files are not named accordingly and located somewhere in a 50-page personal file. AI traces these regardless of the file type or file name and ensures that the PINs are blurred and no longer accessible. If I understood correctly, AI is not only used to remove information from digital files, but also to add information to the database? Tell us more…Indeed, clients also use AI to extend their database. In the past, passports and ID cards were not always registered properly, because there was no need to do so. Nowadays, organisations do need to implement appropriate data minimization measures and store personal information transparently for the customers in order to serve them better and comply with data privacy laws and regulations. Now I’m curious…is that possible?Yes, it is possible, but to do that, you need to use AI. If an organisation would like to recognise the data on an ID card or passport that is in their archive, our AI solutions can help with that. Whether you want to remove existing information from your archive or do the exact opposite, our AI-based software works both ways! Learn more about our Business Intelligence and Governance solutions.

When an application has been on the market for so long, are there still any new trends and developments? We at Hyarchis are seeing developments emerge that are breathing new life into document management systems. In this blog post, Claudia Meessen looks ahead to the five main developments in document management for 2020. 1. CloudWhile the world of financial service providers has long kept all their software in-house, the move to the cloud is now truly unstoppable. Apprehension about storing data in the cloud has made way for a desire to spend less time and money on in-house IT applications. Organizations are not only using separate applications hosted in the cloud, they are even choosing to move their entire IT landscape to the cloud. As a result, document management systems (DMS) are being increasingly relocated to a cloud environment as well. 2. User-friendlyApplication interfaces must first and foremost be web-based. They need to be presented in the cleanest and simplest way possible. This will drive the further development of a dynamic and personalized configuration of DMS screens. Features and rights are not the only factors to consider in this respect, as historic use per individual also increasingly plays a role. I expect screens to be presented in a way that best matches individual users’ search and work behavior. It is all about the user experience, which needs to be just as good for business applications as it is for applications that we are used to as consumers. 3. SecurityThere will be no escaping it in 2020: privacy by design. Luckily, the year 2019 allowed organizations to settle into the new data protection reality created by the implementation of the GDPR in 2018. In 2020, data protection will become a given. If they want to make a difference in 2020, DMS providers will have to take the lead in this respect. I am also seeing the role of DMS providers change significantly, as they play a crucial role in offering expert advice and the kind of tooling that makes it easier for organizations to be compliant, i.e. to comply with rules such as maximum data retention terms.  4. Artificial Intelligence (AI)In 2020, AI will play a crucial role in relation to governance, i.e. compliance with laws and regulations. Many of the archives we deal with have grown so large and complex that it becomes increasingly difficult to ensure that your archive and the millions of documents within it comply with legislation. It is impossible for humans to monitor compliance within such a huge archive. This is where AI-based solutions come in, bringing fully automated compliance monitoring. The year 2020 will also see a cautious first step toward using data from the documents for business intelligence purposes. 5. One single DMS as the central archiveWhat we are seeing more often these days is that multiple applications are linked to one single DMS archive. In practice, this means that our DMS increasingly becomes the central data hub of the application landscape. The role of the DMS is changing as a result due to the DMS gradually acquiring more specialist capability in areas such as integrations, interfaces, access and security. Aside from that, documents in our DMS are increasingly shown to the person who is the actual file owner. Customer portals set up based on the customer self-service principle are used as first-line applications to a greater extent, with the DMS fulfilling a key role in the background. Take a look at our Document Management System.

Organizations that are planning to switch to a new DMS often come up against the same challenges. Jean-Pierre van de Kruijs, Senior Consultant and team lead of Hyarchis’ conversion specialists, explains how to go about it in eight steps. Types of documentsAn existing archive often contains millions of documents, ranging from Microsoft Office documents to graphic files such as .eps or .pdf. They also tend to contain industry-related documents such as copies of passports or valuation reports. A migration process from an existing archive to, in our case, the Hyarchis DMS archive involves archives containing as many as 250 million documents which is not something you do on the side - preparation and monitoring are crucial. That is why I always work my way down a list of eight steps for every migration project that I do. I have branded it “The Hyarchis Conversion Method” and I would like to share this method with you as it has more than proven itself in practice. Eight steps to ensure a carefree migration: 1. Talk to everyone involvedI always start a migration project with a personal introductory meeting on-site at the customer’s premises, to which everyone involved is invited. That is when we discuss the customer’s needs, challenges, and the type of archive. We then make the first agreements, such as when and how to proceed to the deep dive. 2. Deep diveShortly after getting acquainted, the next step is the deep dive into the system to explore the existing archive and its structure. This involves assessing the export options and analyzing the existing mapping route. 3. Project planBased on what I have seen and heard in the previous two steps, I put together a project plan. Within it I describe all the possible scenarios and solutions and estimate the turnaround time. I ultimately capture all the activities, the timetable, and the approach in one single project plan, which I then discuss in detail with the stakeholders from step 1. 4. PreparationDuring this important step, I especially focus on the mapping and on adapting queries to the current situation. I use special tools for this, which Hyarchis has developed based on existing technologies. Migration often involves renumbering and mapping or classifying documents. Mortgages, for example, often get a new loan number when they are imported into a new system, which is something that you must be prepared for with your tooling set. Organizations often take a DMS migration as an opportunity to reduce the number of document formats in their archive, generally reducing it down to two formats: PDF and TIFF. If so, I make sure that we are prepared for that. 5. Trial migrationAs per usual, I start the migration process with a trial run. During such a trial run, we migrate a small part of the archive - generally 5% - so that we can detect potential problems and prevent them during the actual migration. Together with the customer, I check the status both during and after this trial migration to ensure that everything is functioning as it should be. 6. Temporary migration (Bulk migration)One fixed part of the process is an export of the existing document management archive to a temporary Hyarchis DMS archive, including the associated database. If this migration stalls at any point, our tools are configured in such a way that the migration resumes from where it left off after a restart. This is also known as the bulk migration. During this temporary (or bulk) migration, work continues, meaning that documents are still added, removed, or edited from and to the archive. I use migration updates to make sure that new documents can be added. 7. Migration to the permanent environmentEverything is transferred to the new system from the temporary archive and documents get dummy ID numbers to hide them from view in the live system. This step includes yet another check to make sure all the data matches up. Everything in order? If so, this is when I give the green light for the actual conversion, which we often schedule to take place during a weekend. We also execute a delta run, which is an additional export with all the new documents and changes since the initial export. Once this export has been completed successfully, the dummy IDs are replaced with the real IDs, and then all documents are visible in the new Hyarchis DMS. 8. Remove the legacy environmentAnd finally, after the new environment has been accepted by the customer, it is time to think about removing the legacy environment. As you can see, migrating an archive is not to be taken lightly. It requires expert knowledge and an expertly crafted action plan. Thanks to the experience we have built over the past 30 years, Hyarchis has the capability to make every migration a success. Take a look at our Document Management System.