Customer journey automations increases Student Applications by 400% for HSBC
400%
increase in student accounts
87%
faster application process
Challenge
HSBC’s Student Account application process was time consuming and complex. Students were required to fill in a paper form in a branch and wait four weeks for approval. HSBC wanted to reduce lead times and improve the experience of an application.
Getting students to use their student accounts was critical because they often stay customers for years or decades later. Usage would only increase if the application process was better, so that students didn’t go elsewhere for their accounts.
Solution
After conducting stakeholder research with students and in the bank, it became clear that the biggest reason for the delay in processing applications was because submitted documents were subject to branch uploads. Profusion’s team knew that if they were able to move document upload to a central repository, HSBC staff could access and review them easily, and provide feedback to applicants quickly.
To do this Profusion revamped the entire application experience by building an online application process and document upload, and allowed applicants to progress the application via email. This new journey incorporated a feedback loop to the robotics team to help make a decision in just 12 hours vs 4 weeks.
Profusion built and delivered 17 customer journeys based on each application stage and outcome, as well as designing and automating email communications.
Impact
Student account openings have increased by 400%.
Application process time reduced from 4 weeks to just 3 days.
Application process is now seamless with no wait times in branch to apply.
Profusion was asked to digitise and improve the customer journeys for multiple other HSBC brands and application processes.
Sound good?