SBI Cards sees digitisation as vital performance marker

The coronavirus pandemic sped up the pace of digital adoption in the country, according to SBI Cards and Payment Services, in its latest annual report.

Majority owned by State Bank of India, SBI Cards and Payment Services is India’s second-largest credit-card issuer after HDFC Bank.

“The surging need for varied digital payment methods enabled us to attract tech-savvy millennials looking for newer and better experiences,” says Dinesh Kumar Khara, Chairman of SBI Cards and Payment Services in the annual report.

In the past 18 months, credit-card customers found new areas to spend on, like over the top (OTT) platforms, online education, e-pharmacies, and online doctor consultations, the company says in its annual report. It capitalised on this opportunity by building a ‘Digital Journey’ for its users, which involves online client onboarding, digital marketing, and collections.

Still, the financial year 2020-21 (FY 2021) was challenging. The COVID-19 pandemic led to limited movement of people, causing an annual 6 percent decline in users' spend for SBI Cards to Rs 1,22,416 crore.

So, its total income reduced annually by 0.4 percent to Rs 9,713.58 crore, eroding 20 percent off its profit to Rs 984.52 crore compared to 2019-20. However, at 11.8 million in FY 2021, SBI Cards’ customer base grew 12 percent over FY 2020.

"We used data analytics to identify new opportunities for customer engagement through temporal analysis of spend categories and relevant marketing efforts, SBI Cards says. "We rolled out timely and relevant offers to grow spends in various categories.”

Our modern and scalable technology platform today is powered by the best of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and a host of other digital tools, SBI Cards added.

It also partnered with fintech brands like Paytm, Google Pay and JioPay to help young customers transact through their preferred applications on their phone.

Further, SBI Cards added the 'Tap and Pay' feature on its cards, which allows the Near Field Communication (NFC)-enabled point of sale (POS) terminal to directly communicate with a virtual card available on mobile devices to facilitate payments, thereby eliminating the need to swipe physical cards.

Separately, it launched several programs during the financial year to help customers with digital KYC (know your customers) and other queries.

For new customers, it made instant e-credit cards available upon onboarding. Its new customers could perform their transactions without waiting for the physical card to arrive. They could generate pins online and perform transactions with ease.

SBI Cards also highlighted that its Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based virtual assistant, AskILA, addresses more than 4.2 million queries every month. Beyond addressing customer queries, it enables them to conduct certain transactions too.

AskILA facility stood out during the pandemic and allowed customers to avail self-service without the need to connect to an agent, SBI Cards added. During the fiscal, it also introduced video-KYC and E-KYC, which authenticate customers through video or biometric authentication.

Also, attuning to customers' preferred contact and communication channel, SBI Cards launched WhatsApp-based servicing, where instant account information and self-service options are available for its 3 million plus customers.

SBI Cards emphasised that digitisation is a strategic focus area, and an important marker of its performance.