Spurred by high demands placed on call centres during the pandemic, chatbots have taken on new prominence. Mohamed Dabo reports on HSBC’s leadership in the field.
Conversational commerce and AI form a key part of HSBC’s digital transformation plan. “Conversational banking and messaging and chat isn’t a niche channel for us, it’s a significant part of our strategy,” says Katie Jenkins, an HSBC spokesperson.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Conversational banking uses chatbots to exchange messages, ask questions, or give commands.
A year ago, the bank launched its Apple Business Chat channel, providing customers a better way to message directly with HSBC’s customer service centre.
Today, HSBC’s chat channels are making it easy for digital banking customers to get instant answers to queries – and their popularity is booming. Automated chatbots are helping meet this rising demand.
“We’ve seen an explosion in the use of instant messaging in markets around the world. Many customers are making fewer phone calls and switching to instant messaging apps to keep in touch with friends and family,” say Nathan Pearson, global head of Conversational Banking for Wealth and Personal Banking.
How well do you really know your competitors?
Access the most comprehensive Company Profiles on the market, powered by GlobalData. Save hours of research. Gain competitive edge.
Thank you!
Your download email will arrive shortly
Not ready to buy yet? Download a free sample
We are confident about the unique quality of our Company Profiles. However, we want you to make the most beneficial decision for your business, so we offer a free sample that you can download by submitting the below form
By GlobalData“So, we’re providing services to enable retail customers to get support from their bank through those same kind of channels.”
Pearson says the bank uses chatbots to automate some simple enquiries such as how to pay credit card bills, or guidance on setting up mobile banking.
“From a customer perspective, you’re getting an instant response. You’re not having to wait in a queue for a front-line colleague to become available.”
He says HSBC had held 10 million chat conversations a year in 2019. “We expect to handle 10 million a month by 2024.”
“Blending human empathy with intelligent automation”
That move immediately allowed his best agents to create bots that are fuelled by the agents’ own conversational understanding and expertise.
When operating at the scale of HSBC, automation can lighten the pressure put on agents by eliminating repetitive simple tasks.
“Being able to easily blend human empathy with intelligent automation has been crucial to our success,” said Warren Buckley. “Our front-line team now has control over its own destiny and can operate with increased agility — faster and smarter than ever before — to get our customers the resolutions they’re seeking.”
Looking to engage more closely with its customers
HSBC expects messaging to account for more than 50% of contact centre interactions by the end of 2023. This shift will require conversational experts to step up from within its agent base to manage the chatbots they are developing today.
Creating a career opportunity
Empowering non-technical staff to create, optimise, and operationalise bots has forged a whole new career path, forever changing the expectation of the contact centre world.
In the past, this path was defined as agent → team manager → department manager → operations manager → head of contact centre.
The lack of opportunity as this field narrows led to inevitable attrition for HSBC and held back the chance of reaching highest possible customer satisfaction with every interaction.
The introduction of automation, far from reducing opportunity for agents, is now creating new career paths.
“Our agents love the new and exciting career paths open to them. They never thought they’d have the opportunity to build bots, and this stimulating and rewarding work improves satisfaction exponentially,” says Andy Kingston, Head of Offshore & Conversational Banking at HSBC UK.
“With happier employees, attrition rates decrease, and more time and resources can be invested in upskilling our team.”
Studies show that conversational banking cuts out cost and builds customer loyalty.
