The Critical Role of FinTech Under COVID-19

Social distancing and other movement restrictions have deeply impacted every industry, and service businesses have been among the hardest hit. With governments shutting down seating in bars and restaurants, these businesses have found it increasingly difficult to stay open and operate at a profit.

Yet, owing to the various FinTech options available today, many F&B and retail companies can continue to serve customers by keeping an online presence and using electronic payment systems. These services not only let people receive fresh meals while staying safe at home – but they also keep businesses afloat, and support the wider economy at a time when such support is sorely needed.

The right apps at the right time

Thanks to FinTech, shop owners who previously required the physical presence of customers can take their business online. Transportation and related services like Grab, LINE Man, and Rabbit LINE Pay also use this technology, making activities that would have been impossible just a few years ago now feasible using cashless transactions. Innovations like these can make mass self-isolation a tolerable inconvenience for many people, rather than a global catastrophe for us all.

These and other forms of modern commerce are made possible by breakthroughs in payment software. For example, social distancing requirements have forced physical bank branches to shut down for weeks at a time. But financial services, such as the purchase of additional health insurance online, are also made possible by advanced payment platforms. By helping the world manage its finances and protect its health, FinTech systems let people participate in the broader economy without exposing them to unnecessary health risks.

Without these technologies and platforms, demand for food and supplies means people would have to go out, making virus control more difficult. Those apps we downloaded years ago as a convenient way to do our banking, take a taxi, or get home-delivered food, have since become essential to saving lives.

New rules for an old game

Complexity in nature comes from the ability of living things to adapt to changes in their environment. Viruses, while technically not alive, share this essential trait – but so do we. In fact, our ability to anticipate future conditions and plan accordingly can give us a head start in how we evolve and adapt to a new world.

Doctors, medical researchers, vaccine developers, and personal protective equipment (PPE) manufacturers are widely recognized for their essential contributions to keeping us all safe. FinTechs, as perhaps the most unexpected members of this essential group, are proving themselves to be just as indispensable in the current crisis – and for future ones as well.