By Keabetswe Pheko-Moshagane
MD, Absa Bank Botswana
In 2020, we successfully completed our transition from Barclays Plc to Absa. Following this milestone, we birthed a new brand and a new strategy, which will focus on below: • Purposeful leadership with a focus on customer, client and community • Pursuing growth selectively and defending our market share • Accelerating digital first business • Building our entrepreneurial culture and creating a future fit workforce • Protecting returns: by focusing on capital consumption and efficiencies. Ladies and gentlemen, we are intentional about building a scalable digitally led business so that we can meet our customers’ ever-evolving needs.
I am proud to announce that we have made notable strides in this regard, as we launched products and services such as: • Sky Branch – which enables our customers to transact through our contact center over phone • NovoFX – a mobile app that allows foreign currency denominated transactions online. • Chat Bot, Abby – a robot that enables customers to make enquiries and transact on WhatsApp. • Business Banking app – which enabled our business banking clients to transact online.
Over the last year as we ramped up our digitalization drive, we saw our customers increase their uptake of digital offerings by more than 34%, indicating that customer preferences are mounting towards self-service channels.
Today’s engagement speaks to our commitment to helping our customers find a way to get things done. At Absa, we call this Africanacity. As a pan-African bank, we are inspired by the immense potential on our continent and are always looking for innovative solutions to help our stakeholders reach their goals. Today, we officially launch our Digital Corners in Gaborone Industrial Branch. Through our Digital Corners, customers will be able to do an array of transactions online. This will save time and should also reduce queues in our branches as we have enhanced customer self-service channels. These include forex payments, transfers, bill payments, mobile wallet, and card management. Moreover, customers will have access to other services which include digital channels on-boarding, digital channels activations and credit card payments to mention a few. The Covid-19 pandemic has forced us to adapt and find new ways of doing business. As your loyal banking partner, it would have been remiss of us not to address and solve one of the greatest challenges that humanity has ever faced. Customer experience and client centricity remains at the core of our strategy. It is my hope that our Digital corner will enhance our customers’ experience by offering them convenience and improved serviced delivery. Let me not take any more of your time, my parting sentiment to you, is that these are unprecedented times, but it is through our challenges that we grow. I often think about all the inventions that we take for granted today – the light bulb, the wheel, the microwave. All these innovations, started with a challenge or a problem, so I believe we are in the right time to birth the greatest innovations and make dreams come true. Lastly, I would like to appreciate and thank you for being here as we unveil our first ever Digital corners. I am confident that we will continue to solution for our customers and provide relevant services, which will continue to position us a customer centric bank.
*This is part of a speech delivered by Absa Bank Botswana Managing Director Keabetswe Pheko-Moshagane at the inauguration of Absa Bank Botswana Digital Corner