HDFC Achieves Housing Finance Service Excellence with Salesforce

Housing finance provider HDFC is making home financing journeys smoother and faster through a unified customer service and engagement platform.

For over 45 years, HDFC has assisted over 9.8 million customers in realizing their dream of home ownership. The lasting attractiveness of the housing financing company may be due to three factors: a rich heritage, an inventive mentality, and a strong customer focus.

“The biggest differentiator in our industry is service – how quickly we respond to customers and how well we understand their needs,” says Renu Sud Karnad, Managing Director, HDFC. “We have tons of customer data dating back 45 years.” We can now leverage that data to improve the customer experience, whether through 1:1 personalization or self-service, thanks to AI/ML and other upcoming technologies.”

“Home financing isn’t an over-the-counter product; it’s a journey we take with our customers,” says Abhijit Singh, Chief Technology and Digital Officer, HDFC. “Technologies like Salesforce assist us in making that journey as smooth as possible.”

Previously, HDFC managed the client lifecycle with in-house software. These old tools were inefficient since they did not properly integrate with third-party systems.

“We wanted to build a more agile, cloud-enabled, and API-first system of engagement to better serve customers,” Singh says. As a result, he and his team set out to digitize HDFC’s customer lifecycle, beginning with service.

Delighting customers with exceptional service experiences

Customer Connect 2.0 is HDFC’s customer care and engagement platform, built on Salesforce Care Cloud that enables 4,000+ service agents to achieve service excellence through timely communication.

The platform will be utilized for omnichannel servicing across touchpoints, including the online portal, mobile app, customer servicing emails, call center, and modules used during service center visits.

For maximum visibility, customer queries and requests are collected on the platform. Agents may view all customer and loan data on a single screen at the push of a mouse.

“With Customer 360 and Loan 360, we have complete visibility into customer interactions and loan details, which helps us resolve queries faster and smarter,” Singh explains. “Customers leave each interaction satisfied.”

HDFC currently closes 6,000 applications each day on average. Customer follow-up communications are easily linked to the initial case. This has resulted in a 40 percent decrease in the number of monthly cases. TAT for resolution has also been greatly lowered.

Service productivity has also increased. Salesforce Einstein, for example, enables agents to read and categorize emails more quickly. Indeed, service efficiency increased by 30 percent within a few weeks of implementing automatic email classification.

“Earlier, agents spent all of their time managing service requests,” Karnad recalled. “However, thanks to workflow automation, the team is now free to innovate around key challenges.” They consider how to anticipate and prevent common client concerns, how to create a customer care site, and what features to put in our service mobile app. In essence, the team is influencing the future of service.”

Data analytics allows service branch owners to manage workloads and make better-informed decisions. Powerful dashboards assist them in determining which problems can be resolved via customer self-service or closed in the first attempt via automation. In turn, executives have a centralized command center perspective to visualize and monitor service performance.

Reimagining sales and lending journeys with powerful customer engagement tools

HDFC also uses Salesforce Sales Cloud to automate and streamline lead generation, qualification, and nurturing.

Sales professionals may manage hot leads and prospects from anywhere by using the ‘HDFC & You Partners App’ built on Salesforce. All of the information they require to engage prospects more effectively and close more deals is at their fingertips.

“The 360-degree customer view helps us have better conversations with our customers, and they, in turn, expand their footprint with us,” Singh explains.

HDFC will soon employ Salesforce’s platform capabilities to manage the whole loan origination cycle, from customer on-boarding to credit decisioning and disbursement. MuleSoft’s API-led and low-code integration capabilities will connect front-end and back-end systems to improve the customer’s financing experience.

“Getting a loan approved from us should be as easy as ordering a meal on your food delivery app,” Singh says. “Automated workflows will reduce data errors, rework, and inconsistencies, allowing us to disburse loans more quickly.”

The company is seeking to cut credit appraisal TAT by one-third, resulting in a threefold increase in the number of loans given per month.

Meanwhile, dynamic reports provide sales teams with real-time visibility into key performance indicators (KPIs) for sales productivity, performance, and attrition.

“With instant sales insights, decision-making becomes a lot easier,” Singh explains.

These and other advantages were realized thanks to the Salesforce Customer Success team, who worked directly with HDFC to accelerate Salesforce adoption, engagement, and growth.

Investing in the future

HDFC is now attempting to further simplify customer support by providing a myriad of DIY servicing choices for customers via various channels such as the customer portal, mobile app, WhatsApp, and chatbots.

Finally, the organization wishes to assist customers in their home-buying decision.

“Imagine using AR/VR or the metaverse to choose your home,” Singh suggests. “The possibilities with technology are endless.”

“Blockchain, quantum computing, and the metaverse have opened up tremendous opportunities to transform the way we do business,” Karnad continues. But our goal isn’t just to increase operational productivity or efficiency; we also want to better understand and connect with our customers. Salesforce technologies enable us to fulfil both goals at the same time.”