How Humanoid Robots Elevate Your Banking Hospitality Service: The Case of Rabobank
Humanoid Robots today are augmenting customer experiences in the banking industry. Receptions in banks being the first touchpoints between the customer and the company make it an important avenue while implementing digitization. To accelerate the digital transformation, the Dutch multinational banking, and financial services company Rabobank decided to deploy Pepper, a humanoid robot to explore the opportunities of robotics in banking. Let’s explore the challenges faced by Rabobank at the reception area!
Challenges faced by Rabobank
Before Pepper’s deployment, Rabobank was looking to remodel its reception services to ensure a smooth welcome and easy access to the building. The challenge lied in queue management and check-in customers seamlessly, especially in these unprecedented times of COVID-19. To ease the process, 2 Pepper are deployed at the reception for check-in & check-out. With Sparq, who manages the hospitality experience for Rabobank and has expertise in high-end reception services, Pepper reconceptualizes the way customers at the bank are checked-in and helped through the appointment thus ensuring pleasant and safe welcoming services. 
Humanoid Robots as a Solution for Receptions in Banks
Sparq strongly believes that an excellent guest journey makes companies more successful. Humanoid Robots like Pepper are indeed a smart solution for digitalization at the receptions. Especially during COVID-19 where banks have heavy safety regulations to prevent the spread of the virus, Pepper comes to the rescue by keeping customers informed about maintaining a 1.5m distance and wearing a mask. Equipped with a Visitor Management System, Pepper is also responsible for the smooth check-in of its customers, for which Pepper sends an SMS/Email to the host to inform the host and to reduce any delays in meetings. Pepper also informs the customers about the total waiting time and also asks about their favorite beverage! Additionally, on every 1st day of the month, Pepper is responsible for checking in and issuing badges for the new hires at Rabobank. Furthermore humanoid robots due to their social appeal ensure an honest feedback collection from customers. Unlike the earlier 1-5 star closed feedback, Pepper takes open-ended feedback from all customers ensuring continuous improvement of services at Rabobank. Pepper takes less social space than humans, also allowing customers to give honest feedback after every visit.
How was Pepper perceived by Rabobank’s employees and customers?
Pepper’s deployment resulted in an outstanding strong impression with the new employees. New employees rated their first experience with 4.7/5 stars on an average rating for the first 3 quarters showing a high amount of satisfaction.
Customers rated their experience as pleasant and safe by giving a rating of 4.4/5.
During the pandemic when limited customers were visiting the bank, Pepper was able to interact with a total of 549 guests in January and 781 guests in February.
Additionally, Guest sentiment indicates an overall positive/neutral rating in March!
According to Roeland Van Oers, Founder of Welbo, a SoftBank Robotics Partner, “Pepper provides more opportunities to level up hospitality since it is more data-driven and helps in continuous improvement. It also helps gather comprehensive data which was lost earlier” The founder adds that they are looking forward to the increased use of robots in their office in other locations of Rabobank in the future. In the same lines, Nicole Hoppenbrouwers, Consultant at Sparq said, “Pepper welcomes you personally and it’s like an invitation. You have a smooth ride when you go to Rabobank, it is a whole new experience” Nicole also added that at a later stage, they would be working with QR Codes and number plate recognition which will allow for simplified access controls, thus leading to spending more time with the guest. Discover more about how social robots optimize the banking hospitality services through our webinar linked below!
Final Thoughts
Several factors have led to the increasing innovation of reception spaces in banking. Needs such as better working efficiency, locating visitor information, enhancing information security, and feedback collection to list a few are the need of the hour for all receptions in banks. Humanoid Robots in banks today are paving the way for innovation and effective management. Paired with a Visitor Management System, you can create an innovative perspective for your brand, allowing your receptionists to focus on more important tasks! COVID-19 measures such as Mask Detection or the Navigation Feature on Pepper can largely sort out the spread of the virus in your bank keeping it a pleasant and safe place for all visitors and employees. According to Nicole Hoppenbrouwers, Consultant at Sparq, “My personal favorite is Pepper’s ability to talk to you about COVID-19 rules. Owing to the longer duration of the virus spread, it is important to be reminded of safety rules which sometimes can be boring and negative. We wanted to create positive communication especially when talking about COVID-19 and Pepper does it really well for us”. Want to gain more insights into how our humanoid robots make a difference in the banking industry? Contact us now!
