The Challenge
Barclays Bank was already benefiting from the ways that digital banking created efficiency across many of their customer engagement operations. The case for online and mobile app channels for customers to engage, perform transactions and conduct servicing actions was clear: customers who had a good relationship with the bank and were good at managing their finances were happy to use the channel. This in turn provided a more cost efficient operation to the bank than branch or telephone banking. The question was raised, could this also be made true for customers who were in financial difficulty, and for whom the bank had to provide a costly labour-intensive collections operation?
Barclays Bank were already aware that customers who fell into arrears also fell out of using their digital services, which were just not set up to help them through the steps that they needed to take. Barclays realised that they needed a new kind of digital experience, one that complimented the collections team’s operation and could help a customer make the right choices to resolve their debt.
The Solution
Barclays Bank selected our digital banking platform, and our digital banking experience, to build a new, innovative and compliant experience designed specifically for customers who were in arrears.
We worked closely with the customer experience and collections team to devise, prototype and then build a dedicated, easy to use secure online channel for customers to self-serve their way through the debt recovery process. Working alongside the telephony channel, the digital experience allowed customers to:
1 – Safely identify themselves without the need to register to use the portal
2 – See the arrears amount and have the option to settle with a debit card payment
3 – Make an arrangement to settle the amount in the next few weeks
4 – Set up and view a monthly repayment plan for the amount owed
5 – Get in touch with the bank to discuss these options in further detail
6 – Access and return to the channel any time, 24/7.
Barclays Bank now had an additional channel through which customers could engage with them in times of financial difficulty to seek help and resolve their debt
The Outcome
Working closely with the Barclays Bank unsecured lending collections operation the solution successfully improved the outcomes for thousands of customers, as well as recovering more debt for the bank. The cost to recover was lower than for those customers who were managed purely through the traditional collections processes.
