Intelligent automation in banking has already been in discussion for years

The financial industry today is on the brink of digital transformation. The sector has always been at the forefront of technological innovation to drive a better banking experience for customers. Modern technology, particularly robotic process automation (RPA), has a pivotal role to play in banking, automating complex banking processes. Now financial services providers are exploring intelligent automation, the fusion of AI and RPA, which is already having a significant impact on the way businesses function, solve problems, and communicate with customers across industries.

Since most banks have begun the automation journey, they are investing in innovation and are exploring ways to harness the power of RPA with machine learning, chatbots, cognitive services, and analytics. These cutting-edge technologies assist customer service representatives to better perform their roles by automating application logins or ordering tasks and ensuring customers receive better and faster service.

Intelligent automation has multiple roles in financial services. It brings together RPA-augmented capabilities such as workflow orchestration, process intelligence, unstructured data capture, intelligent OCR, machine learning, omnichannel, and advanced analytics to drive maximum value. Leveraging intelligent automation improves financial firms’ outcomes through bolstering capacity, productivity, and accuracy; improving employee satisfaction, and enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty.

According to a report from Kofax, banks can achieve productivity gains of 35 percent-50 percent by leveraging enterprise automation and garner greater capacity and agility.

Why Does Intelligent Automation in Banking Matter?

Integrating an intelligent automation system can lead to augmented process speed, minimized costs and improved quality, enhanced employee experience and customer retention/advocacy, and increased flexibility to address short-term volume variations. It also gives the ability to cope smoothly with regulatory/compliance changes, find new services based on AI-generated insights and gain a competitive advantage based on proprietary algorithms, data and knowledge

Since customer experience (CX) is an indispensable factor for businesses to grow, it relies heavily on personalized and instant business services. CX is significantly imperative in banking to supplement banking offerings. By integrating intelligent automation, banks can gain profound insights into their customers to meet their needs and preferences. According to IDC, global corporate spending on cognitive/AI systems is predicted to witness an increase in the annual rate of 54 percent between 2015 and 2020.

When implementing intelligent automation effectively, Accenture noted that companies must look at diminishing ROI, source data quality, monetary expense, technical knowledge gaps, potential redundancy, outdated platforms and systems, security gaps, and auditability. Furthermore, a study from the company estimates that banks that embrace intelligent automation can see a rise of 34 percent in their revenues by 2022, while employment could grow by 14 percent. Besides, around 79 percent of financial services believe that AI will work alongside humans in their organizations within the next two years, performing as a co-worker, collaborator and trusted advisor.

Thus, considering these growing trends, we can expect automation technology will sit at the front seat for customer interaction as more and more banks engage with customers using AI-assisted systems.