What Are eSign And eKYC?

How Can eSign And eKYC APIs Help Your Business?

eSign API Service

Aadhaar-based eSign service enables Aadhaar-holders to sign documents electronically from any remote location. To eSign a document online, apart from an Aadhaar number, the signer will need a mobile number registered with his/her Aadhaar number, to which a one-time password (OTP) will be sent to. In case an Aadhaar holder doesn’t have an Aadhaar registered mobile number, the individual’s biometrics or iris scan may be used as an alternative. The signer can also share the document with another party to get their eSign on the same.

eKYC API Service

eKYC refers to electronic Know Your Customer. The eKYC, developed by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), is a digital solution for the erstwhile KYC. It allows Aadhaar holders to digitally share the KYC with registered service providers in a mode which is safe and legally compliant, by authorising UIDAI.

What Is eSign?

eSign refers to a signature made electronically. Aadhaar-based eSign is among the Government of India’s initiatives which allows Aadhaar holders of age 18 years or above to sign documents electronically. eSign is authenticated by the Information Technology Act, 2000, and hence, it is legally valid and is considered equal to one’s vet signature.

Who Needs eSign?

Every Aadhaar-holder can make use of eSign service to sign documents online from any remote location. Besides individuals, eSign service, especially eSign API can benefit firms or organisations dealing with transactions that include availing customers’ signature on agreements, deeds or any other documents as a part of their business processes.

What Is eKYC?

Know Your Customer (KYC) is a process implemented by businesses for customer identification and verification. eKYC is the short form of Electronically Know Your Customer Service extended by UIDAI which is basically, a paperless KYC. While the normal KYC formalities take around 2 days or more to manually verify the details provided by a customer, eKYC process does that in just a few minutes.

The authorities including Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) and Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) have all given their approval to the usage of eKYC as a valid form of KYC.

Who Needs eKYC Service?

As per the rules put forth by the Securities Exchange Control Board of India (SEBI), every institute dealing with financial transactions or functioning as financial intermediaries should verify its customer’s identity under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002. To ease out the customers’ identity verification process by means of the paperless eKYC, the market regulator SEBI minimised the KYC requirements for small retail investors. It also permitted the usage of Aadhaar Card as a valid KYC document on a voluntary basis.

Besides bringing down the paperwork involved in transactions, eKYC saves storage space, cost and time taken for the same. Moreover, eKYC enables filing to happen in real-time which is the need of the hour. The introduction of the KYC process by the financial and mutual funds institutions in India helps in evading money frauds and detecting suspicious activities of account holders.

The main purpose of the eKYC service is to be a public benefit service. Any firm/ organisation, especially organisations like banks, financial services, mutual funds companies, telecom companies, institutions, etc. which involves regulatory compliance to accomplish KYC function can use the eKYC service to serve its purpose after seeking approval by the UIDAI.

At present, as per the regulations, only the resident Indians are permitted to make use of Aadhaar based eKYC using one-time password (OTP) based verification.

How To Avail eSign API Or eKYC API?

Since Application Program Interfaces (APIs) seem to act as a stimulus to most of the interdependent web services these days, we, at eSignDesk.com, have come up with eSign API to make things simpler. The eSign API allows you to get your customers’ signature on documents electronically using Aadhaar-based eSign service. 

We believe that using our APIs would ease the way you have been working so far. If you are someone looking for help in easing out your firm’s documentation hassles, then click the button below and submit your request.