Sandeep Batra, ICICI Bank: We have continued to reimagine existing digital journeys

ICICI Bank, India’s second-largest private lender, has recorded an impressive 19% year-on-year growth to Rs. 4,940 crore in profit after tax (PAT) for the quarter ended December 31, 2020. The impressive growth in net profit has also been driven by seamless and secure digital banking initiatives that the Bank offers to its customers.

Sandeep Batra, ICICI Bank, Executive Director on Q3 results:

“We have continued to reimagine existing digital journeys in order to decongest delivery of service and enhance customer experience”, said Mr. Sandeep Batra, Executive Director, ICICI Bank, in an address to the media. While the Bank has always been at the forefront of digital banking innovations, during the Covid-19 pandemic, the Bank has been quick to embrace digital solutions with a mobile-first strategy to deliver exceptional customer experiences, despite the lockdown constraints.

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Over 90% of the savings account transactions at December 31, 2020 have been conducted via digital channels like mobile banking, net banking, POS, and other platforms. The Bank has seen a surge in digital purchase in 9M-2021 -- 90% of personal loans were sourced via insta and digital onboarding, 82% credit card were sourced digitally, 36% of the term life insurance policies were sold online, 59% of fixed deposits and 53% of mutual fund SIPs were also sourced digitally. In December 2020 alone, 41% of salary account customers and 46% of credit card customers were on-boarded using the Video KYC feature.

This is a testament to the success and acceptance of the Bank’s digital initiatives among an increasingly digital-savvy customer base.

“Mortgage disbursements increased further in Q3-2021 over Q2-2021 and reached an all-time monthly high in December driven by the Bank’s efforts to offer a convenient and frictionless experience to customers by digitizing the entire underwriting process, with instant loan approvals.” added Sandeep Batra.

Let’s look at some of the digital banking initiatives that boosted the bank’s financial performance in Q3 FY21.

ICICI Stack

The ICICI STACK is core to the bank’s digital strategy, enabling it to create, curate, and provide hyper-personalized banking solutions to customers across their relationship journey. The Bank offers bespoke digital solutions for both corporate and institutional customers suited to their lifecycle or business needs. “The steady increase in adoption and fund flows through our digital financial supply chain and trade platforms has contributed to the growth of our deposit franchise,” explained Sandeep Batra.

Mobile Banking

The lockdown has seen a surge in the adoption of digital payments. ICICI Bank has upgraded its state-of-the-art mobile banking app, iMobile, to iMobile Pay, which now offers payment and banking services to not only ICICI customers but to those of any bank. About 5 lakh non-ICICI Bank customers have used iMobile Pay since its launch just two months ago. The volume of mobile banking transactions has also grown by 60% year-on-year in Q3-2021. There’s also been an increase in the value of merchant acquiring transactions on UPI by 286% year-on-year in this quarter.

Banking for Millennials

Millennials are a significant customer base for ICICI Bank. The Bank has launched ‘ICICI Bank Mine’, India’s first comprehensive banking programme for millennials, designed to provide a new-age banking experience to a millennial customer base. The platform, designed with a fresh UI, offers an instant savings account, a feature-rich iMobile application, personal finance management and investment guidance, and other offerings such as curated credit and debit cards, instant personal loans & and overdrafts for the digitally-savvy, value-seeking millennials.

Co-Branded Cards

The Bank has issued about 1.4 million Amazon Pay credit cards since its launch in 2018. It is the fastest co-branded card in India to have surpassed the milestone of 1 million in less than 20 months since its launch.

FASTag

“We are the market leader in electronic toll collections through FASTag,” commented Sandeep Batra. The Bank has seen an 85% year-on-year growth in average monthly transactions by value on FASTag in Q3-202, with its market share by value at 37% in December 2020.

Cardless EMI Facility

The Bank has also rolled out the ‘ICICI Bank Cardless EMI’ facility which allows pre-approved customers to purchase their favourite gadgets or home appliances using their mobile phone and Permanent Account Number (PAN) without needing cards or physical wallets. The high-value transactions can also be converted into easy, no-cost monthly instalments by simply using their PAN and registered mobile number on PoS machines at the retail outlets.