“ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION IN BANKING SECTOR”

MINI PROJECT-II

Submitted to

Dr A P J Abdul Kalam Technical University, Lucknow

In partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of

Master of Business Administration

Prepared by: Under the Guidance of:

Ragini Yadav NEETU SINGH

MBA 2nd Semester Associate professor

Roll Number: Department of business organization

Enrollment No.

2022-2023

Department of Business Administration

Technical Education & Research

 Institute

Post-Graduate College, Ghazipur – 233001 (U.P.)

 Certificate

This is to certify that Ragini Yadav, pursuing MBA-2nd

Semester from this institute, has prepared the Mini Project-I, entitled

“Robotic Process Automation in banking sector” in partial fulfillment

of the requirements of the degree of Master of Business

Administration from Dr A P J Abdul Kalam Technical University,

Lucknow, for the session 2022-2023.

This Project report is undertaken by Ragini Yadav under the

guidance of Dr. Neetu singh during the course of MBA-II Semester

and fulfills the requirements of regulations relating to the nature and

standard of MBA course of Dr A P J Abdul Kalam Technical

University, Lucknow

I recommend that this project report may be sent for evaluation.

Dr Neetu Singh

Associate Professor & Head,

Dept. of Business Administration

 Dr Neetu Singh

Associate Professor & Head,

Dept. of Business Administration

 Declaration

I, Ragini Yadav, hereby declare that this Mini Project-1I

entitled “Robotic Process Automation in banking sector” has

been prepared by me during the course of MBA-II Semester,

under the guidance of Dr. Neetu Singh.

This project report is my bona fide work and has not been

submitted in any form to any University or Institute for the award

of any degree or diploma prior to the under mentioned date. I

bear the entire responsibility of submission of this project report.

Ragini Yadav

MBA 2nd Semester

Department of Business

Administration Technical

Education & Research Institute

P. G. College, Ghazipur
 ABSTRACT

Robotic process automation is a smart way to manage work across those

machines which AI can easily categorize. Robot Automation is a

sequence of steps that results in a meaningful action without interference

of human beings. In any organization, Robot automation can perform

tasks just like a human being. RPA is a program in which a sequence of

commands are executed as per the predefined rules of organization.

When any organization changes its rules then either it needs to hire new

employees that can work with new rules or it has to provide training to

existing employees to map the requirements of new rules. These both

ways are time and money consuming. By the use of Robotic automation,

the company can place effective workers that can do an impression of

human workers.
I Abstract

II Acknowledgment

III Index

Chapter No Topic Page No

1. Introduction Of Robotic Process Automation

2. History

3. RPA in Banking

4. Benefit Of Robotic Process Automation

5. Advantages of Robotic Process Automation

6. How Does RPA Use

7. Challenges Of RPA

8. Impact Business Operation

9. Advantage And Disadvantage

10. Conclusion

11. References
 1.Introduction

Robotic process automation (RPA) is the application of technology that allows employees

in a company to configure computer software or a “robot” to capture and interpret existing

applications for processing a transaction, manipulating data, triggering responses and

communicating with other digital systems.

Any company that uses labor on a large scale for general knowledge process work, where

people are performing high-volume, highly transactional process functions, will boost their

capabilities and save money and time with robotic process automation software.

Just as industrial robots are remaking the manufacturing industry by creating higher

production rates and improved quality, RPA “robots” are revolutionizing the way we think

about and administer business processes, IT support processes, workflow processes, remote

infrastructure and back-office work. RPA provides dramatic improvements in accuracy and

cycle time and increased productivity in transaction processing while it elevates the nature

of work by removing people from dull, repetitive tasks. The technology of RPA can be

applied specifically to a wide range of industries.

RPA Tutorial

Our RPA Tutorial provides the basic and advanced concepts of RPA. This tutorial is

designed for both beginners and professionals.

This tutorial gives you an introduction to RPA along with a wide range of RPA topics such

as RPA Features, RPA Applications, RPA Tools, RPA Examples, and RPA Interview

Questions, etc.

What is RPA?

RPA stands for Robotic Process Automation. It is the technology used for software tools

that automate human tasks, which are manual, rule-based, or repetitive. Typically, it is like a

bot that performs such tasks at a much higher rate than a human alone. These RPA software

bots never sleep and make zero mistakes, and can interact with in-house applications,

websites, user portals, etc. They can log into applications, enter data, open emails and

attachments, calculate and complete tasks, and then log out.

The term Robotic Process Automation creates a picture of physical robots doing some labor-

intensive human physical tasks such as uploading or unloading heavy goods from a vehicle or

cleaning the house etc. However, in reality, the picture is completely different. The word

'Robot' in 'RPA' is not a physical robot but a virtual system that helps in automating the

repetitive manual computing or business process tasks.

 2. History

RPA is the combination of several technologies, brought together under one toolkit for

different automation purposes. Though the term 'RPA' emerged in the early 2000s, the

initial development was started after the 1990s.

'Machine Learning (ML)' is one of those technologies that helped towards innovation,

which eventually lead to the creation of RPA. In 1959, 'Arthur Samuel' developed Machine

Learning. Machine Learning allowed computers to perform several critical tasks, such as

translation and text summarization, etc. However, there were limits on how computers

could process language. It led to the development of 'Natural Language Processing (NLP),'

which helped computers to understand and process human language more accurately. In

1960, NLP combined 'AI (Artificial Intelligence)' for establishing the interactions between

computers and human languages. Then, the technology progressed further towards the

establishment of RPA, and there were few more developments in the 1990s.

Because of the continuous developments, there was an emergence of technology that most

closely resembled RPA. The history of RPA tells that there were three key predecessors of

Robotic Process Automation that are given below

Screen Scraping
Screen Scraping technology is considered as a significant step towards the creation of

RPA. This technology is used to extract data from web, programs, and documents, which is

further displayed by another application.

While there were many benefits of screen scraping over manual labor, screen scraping was

also limited to some extent. Due to limitations and lack of availability of source codes,

programmers, and documentation, it became difficult to understand for the average

business user.

Workflow Automation and Management Tools

Workflow automation is the process that includes a series of automated actions, which

helps in reducing the human task. These actions must be repetitive so that their steps are

predictable. Such actions can be automated by using automated management tools.

Workflow automation uses business rules to decide when the step has been completed, and

the execution of the next can be started.

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is the ability of computer machines or robots to perform tasks that

typically require human intelligence. AI programming is based on three techniques:

learning, reasoning, and self-correction.

The applications for artificial intelligence are endless and can be applied to many different

sectors and industries. Some of the commonly used technologies of AI are:

Image Recognition - It is the technology that identifies and detects objects or attributes in

images or videos.
Speech Recognition - It is the technology that identifies words and phrases in spoken

language and converts them into a machine-readable format.

Natural Language Generation - It is the technology that transforms structured data into

natural language.

Sentiment Analysis - It is the technology that uses natural language processing, text

analysis, and biometrics to identify, extract, quantify, and study subjective information.

All these technologies together made RPA such an impactful technological platform and

added more benefits for the business users..

3.Historic evolution

Although the term "robotic process automation" can be traced to the early 2000s, it had

been developing for a number of years previously. RPA evolved from three key

technologies: screen scraping, workflow automation and artificial intelligence.

Screen scraping is the process of collecting screen display data from a legacy application so

that the data can be displayed by a more modern user interface. The advantages of

workflow automation software, which eliminates the need for manual data entry and

increases order fulfillment rates, include increased speed, efficiency and accuracy. Lastly,

artificial intelligence involves the ability of computer systems to perform tasks that

normally require human intervention and intelligence.

As a form of automation, the same concept has been around for a long time in the form of

screen scraping but RPA is considered to be a significant technological evolution of this

technique in the sense that new software platforms are emerging which are sufficiently
mature, resilient, scalable and reliable to make this approach viable for use in large

enterprises (who would otherwise be reluctant due to perceived risks to quality and

reputation).

By way of illustration of how far the technology has developed since its early form in

screen scraping, it is useful to consider the example cited in one academic study. Users of

one platform at Xchanging - a UK-based global company which provides business

processing, technology and procurement services across the globe - anthropomorphized

their robot into a co-worker named "Poppy" and even invited "her" to the Christmas party.

Such an illustration perhaps serves to demonstrate the level of intuition, engagement and

ease of use of modern RPA technology platforms that leads their users (or “trainers” to

relate to them as beings rather than abstract software services. The "code free" nature of

RPA (described below) is just one of a number of significant differentiating features of

RPA vs. screen scraping.

 3.What is RPA in Banking?

The Banking and Financial industry is seen to be growing exponentially over the past few

years with the implementation of technological advancements resulting in faster, more

secure, and reliable services. To remain competitive in an increasingly saturated market –

especially with the more widespread adoption of virtual banking – banking firms have had to

find a way to deliver the best possible user experience to their customers. As per Gartner,

the pandemic has catalyzed the business initiatives to adapt to the demands of employees and

customers and make digital options the future of banking services.

Robotic Process Automation in Banking and Finance

● RPA in banking and finance is termed as the use of robotic applications to augment

human-efforts. 

● In simple words, RPA helps banks and financial institutions in the digital

transformation to automate repetitive manual processes, allowing employees to focus

on more crucial tasks, and eventually leading firms to gain a competitive edge and

greater customer satisfaction. RPA is a valuable tool to cater to the pressing demands

of the banking segment and help them maximize efficiency by minimizing operational

costs.

● A basic rule-driven robotic process automation is limited in what it can do. It follows

the rules to automate tasks without any changes. For example, it logs into an account,

moves files from different folders, and logs out.

● But, McKinsey predicts a second wave of automation and Artificial Intelligence,

termed Intelligent Automation, in the coming years where software bots and machines
 will execute 10% to 25% of tasks across a myriad of banking functions, broadening

the capacity and simultaneously offering the workforce the opportunity to focus on

higher-value tasks and projects.

● Note: Here, we’ll use RPA to imply both regular and intelligent process automation. 

● According to a McKinsey report, general accounting operations have the lion’s share

of automation in finance. At the same time, business development functions can

only be automated up to 56%.

By now, it would be right to say that every industry has found a way to incorporate robotic

process automation (RPA) into its workflow, but so far, banking and finance are leading the

way.

Why? Because
 ➢ Investment banks, customer service banks deal, clearing organizations, exchanges and

many others are increasingly recognizing the power of automation and the benefits of

transforming their business process.

Robotic Process Automation is the best solution for the Banking and Financial Services

Industry

Banking and financial institutions have to deal with millions of customer documents and

information collected from multiple sources. For example, Validating Credit Card

Application. A credit card company has to validate all the customer information with the

documents. If done manually, this process may take days, affecting customer experience.

Banks and financial institutions are full of such manual, repetitive processes. Few of them are

listed below:

9. Compliance
1. Customer Service
10. Credit Card Processing
2. Accounts Payable
11. Fraud detection
3. Mortgage Processing
12. General Ledger
4. KYC
13. Account Closure
5. Report Automation
14. Quote Surrender
6. Account Origination & Receivable
15. Underwriter Support
7. Collection

8. Deposits

Deployment

The hosting of RPA services also aligns with the metaphor of a software robot, with each

robotic instance having its own virtual workstation, much like a human worker. The robot

uses keyboard and mouse controls to take actions and execute automations. Normally all of
 these actions take place in a virtual environment and not on screen; the robot does not need

a physical screen to operate, rather it interprets the screen display electronically. The

scalability of modern solutions based on architectures such as these owes much to the

advent of virtualization technology, without which the scalability of large deployments

would be limited by available capacity to manage physical hardware and by the associated

costs. The implementation of RPA in business enterprises has shown dramatic cost savings

when compared to traditional non-RPA solutions.

RPA across industries

Automation is the future of business, and the best way forward for digital transformation. The

organizations that miss out on this opportunity will not be able to keep up with the

competition.

Finance & Banking

Save millions on compliance fees.

BPO

Reduce transaction times by 80% or more.

Telecom

Improve employee productivity by as much as 300%. 

Healthcare

Introduce a solution with a low learning curve for users. 

Insurance

Save more than 50% on current operating costs.

Logistics

Cut costs by 37% and execute processes 10x faster.

Manufacturing

Lower costs by 40% or more while driving innovation

Public Sector

Speed up document validation by up to 95%

In Banking Sector

The Banking and Financial industry is seen to be growing exponentially over the past few

years with the implementation of technological advancements resulting in faster, more

secure, and reliable services. To remain competitive in an increasingly saturated market –

especially with the more widespread adoption of virtual banking – banking firms have had to

find a way to deliver the best possible user experience to their customers. As per Gartner,

the pandemic has catalyzed the business initiatives to adapt to the demands of employees and

customers and make digital options the future of banking services.

RPA in the banking industry can be leveraged to automate multiple time-consuming,

repetitive processes like account opening, KYC process, customer services, and many others.

Using RPA 2in banking operations not only streamlines the process efficiency but also

enables banking organizations to make sure that cost is reduced and the process is executed at

an efficient time. According to reports, RPA in banking sector is expected to reach $1.12

billion by 2025. Also, by leveraging AI technology in conjunction with RPA, the banking

industry can implement automation in the complex decision-making banking process like

fraud detection, and anti-money laundering.

4. Importance Of RPA In Banking Sector

Bank employees deal with voluminous data from customers and manual processes are prone

to errors. With huge data extraction and manual processing of banking operations lead to

errors.

Moreover, a single error in the important banking process leads to the case of theft, fraud, and

money laundering. Instead of humans processing data manually, simple validation of

customer information from 2 systems can take seconds instead of minutes with bots.

Introducing bots for such manual processes can reduce processing costs by 30% to 70%.

Several processes in the banks can be automated to free up the manpower to work on more

critical tasks.
● Customer Service

Banks deal with multiple queries every day ranging from account information to

application status to balance information

RPA can automate such rule-based processes to respond to queries in real-time and

reduce turnaround time to seconds, freeing up human resources for more critical tasks

With the help of artificial intelligence, RPA can also resolve queries that need

decision-making. By using NLP, Chatbot Automation enables bots to understand the

natural language of chatting with customers and respond like humans.

● Compliance

Banking being the center of the economy is closely governed and needs to adhere to

many compliances. According to an Accenture survey in 2016, 73% of respondents

believed that RPA can be a key enabler in compliance. RPA increases productivity

with 24/7 availability and the highest accuracy improving the quality of the

compliance process.

● Accounts Payable

Accounts payable is a simple but monotonous process in the banking system. It

requires extracting vendor information, validating it, and then processing the

payment. This does not require any intelligence making it the perfect case for RPA.

Robotic Process Automation with the help of optical character recognition (OCR)

solutions can solve this problem. OCR can read the vendor information from the

digital copy physical form and provide information to the RPA system. RPA will
 validate the information with the information in the system and process the payment.

If any error occurs, RPA can notify the executive for resolution.

● Credit Card Processing

Traditional credit card application processing used to take weeks to validate the

customer information and approve credit cards. The long waiting period was

dissatisfaction to customers and cost to banks. However, with the help of RPA, banks

now can process the application within hours. RPA can talk to multiple systems

simultaneously to validate the information like required documents, background

checks, credit checks and take the decision based on rules to approve or disapprove

the application.

● Mortgage Loan

In the United States, it takes approx. 50 to 53 days to process a mortgage loan.

Process of approving a mortgage loan goes through various checks like credit checks,

repayment history, employment verification, and inspection. A minor error can slow

down the process. As the process is based on a specific set of rules and checks, RPA

can accelerate the process and clear the bottleneck to reduce the processing time to

minutes from days.

● Fraud Detection

With the introduction of digital systems, one of the major concerns of banks is fraud.

It is really difficult for banks to track all the transactions to flag the possible fraud

transaction. Whereas RPA can track the transactions and raise the flag for possible
 fraud transaction patterns in real-time reducing the delay in response. In certain cases,

RPA can prevent fraud by blocking accounts and stopping transactions.

● KYC Process

Know Your Customer (KYC) is a mandatory process for banks for every customer.

This process includes 500 to 1000+ FTEs to perform necessary checks on the

customers. According to Thomson Reuters, banks spend more than $384 million per

year on KYC process compliance.

Considering the cost of the manual process, banks have started using RPA to validate

customer data. With increased accuracy, banks no longer have to worry about the

FTEs and the process can be completed with minimal errors and staff.

● General Ledger

The banks must keep the general ledger updated with information like financial

statements, revenue, assets, liabilities, expenses, and revenue which is used to prepare

financial statements. Financial statements are the public documents that are then

accessed by the public, stakeholders, and media. Considering the amount of detailed

information in the statement, errors in the report can very badly affect the bank’s

image.

To create the statement, the bank needs to update information from the multiple

legacy systems as these systems cannot integrate, verify it and make sure that the

general ledger is prepared with no errors. With this amount of data from multiple

systems, it is bound to have errors. Here comes RPA to the rescue. RPA is

independent of the technology and can integrate data from multiple legacy systems to
 present in the required format even if the data in the systems are not in the same

format. This reduces the huge amount of data handling and time.

● Report Automation

Like all other public companies, banks need to prepare reports and present them to

their stakeholders to show their performance. Considering the importance of the

report, there is no chance for the bank to make an error.

While RPA systems provide data in multiple formats, they can create reports by auto-

filling the available report format to create reports without errors and minimum time

● Account Closure Process

With such a huge number of customers, it is supposed to get some account closure

requests monthly. There can be various reasons for the account closures and one of

them is when a client has failed to provide the mandatory documents.

With Robotic Process Automation, it is easy to track such accounts, send automated

notifications, and schedule calls for the required document submissions. RPA can also

help banks to close accounts in exceptional scenarios like customers failing to provide

KYC documents.

● Underwriter Support

Underwriting is the process of assessing the risk of financial transactions such as bond

issues, bank loans, and insurance policies. Collecting data from multiple systems and

analyzing them before entering into the system requires huge manual effort and

efficiency as well and processing them manually is a tiring and time-consuming

 process. Here RPA can play a better role in automating the underwriting process.

Automated underwriting processes in banking enable taking loan-related decisions

based on algorithms rather than relying on inhuman beings.RPA in underwriting

removes the risk of manual error, and misinterpretation of loan risks, and takes care of

biases while having decisions.

● Cash Collection and Deposits

Cash collection and deposits is another challenge that banking and financial

organizations often struggle with. Collecting tasks from multiple points of sales and

migrating them to different branches accurately is an erroneous process. Instead of

giving humans the task of maintaining the data records, RPA in banking can take care

of all the records coming from multiple sources, and integrate them into a centralized

system for easy access and sharing. Also, the security of transactions is maintained

and there are no risks of money theft and alert in case of any fraudulent activity.

● Account Origination Process

Account origination is a time-consuming process ranging from application and

underwriting to disbursal of funds. Banking service desk staff has to go through

multiple steps of origination processes like pre-qualification documentation, the

application process, the underwriting process, credit decision, quality check, and

initiating loan funding.

Implementing RPA in this process removes the need for data collection and removes

the errors all across the process and enables faster loan processing and meets the

regulatory compliances and rules.

Banks can do more with less human resources and rip the financial benefits with RPA. A

survey in the financial section by PricewaterhouseCoopers shows that 30% of the respondents

were not only experimenting with RPA but were on the way to adopting it enterprise-wide.

5.How to Implement RPA in Banking?

Once the Automation Roadmap is ready, financial institutes can go for ‘Proof of Concept’ in

which the business benefits can be demonstrated and the automation approach can be refined.

For effective RPA implementation, Banking organizations can follow the below steps:

1. Identify the finance areas for automation

2. Develop a multifaceted automation roadmap for implementation

3. Identify, evaluate, and partner with the right providers to support the design and

implementation

4. Build an enterprise-wide delivery model and governance strategy to help the global

business

Organize training sessions and design a change management strategy to drive effective
 6.APPLICATIONS OF RPA

The economic advantages of RPA implementation are substantial and worth emphasizing.

Payback was stated to be less than a year, with robots providing an average of 20% of full-

time equivalent (FTE) capacity. RPA strives to satisfy and surpass expectations in a variety

of ways. Additionally, surveys have shown that more than 90% of C-level executives report

their companies currently have a certain degree of intelligent automation in operation. But,

what are some of the most recent applications of RPA? What advantages does it provide, and

how has modern industry benefited from it? Listed below are a few of the leading

applications of RPA:

● ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION IN BANKING

One of the best applications of RPA is in the banking industry. Leveraging technological

breakthroughs leading to quicker, more reliable, and dependable services, the Banking and

Financial business has seen exponential growth over the last several years. RPA assists

banking and accounting departments in automating time-consuming manual operations,

allowing employees to focus on more important activities and gaining a strategic edge for the

company. RPA has been widely utilised in this industry to help organise and automate time-

consuming banking activities. In fact, RPA in the banking sector is estimated to reach $1.12

billion by 2025, according to studies. Banks have been able to dramatically minimise the

need for human participation by shifting most of the laborious, manual operations from

workers to machines, which has had a direct influence on everything from productivity and

efficiency levels to staffing concerns and expenditures.

● ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION IN HEALTHCARE

Many incredibly sensitive client engagements occur in the healthcare industry, but there are

also many time-consuming, tedious procedures and administrative functions that do not

require technical expertise. From front-office activities to operational procedures to patient

engagement and bill payment, RPA can automate tasks across the organisation. It can cut

costs, enhance the pace of procedures, streamline activities, maximize the productivity of

business processes, and optimize the patients’ experiences in healthcare institutions. The need

for Robotic Process Automation in healthcare business is only expected to grow, with the

global market forecasted to touch $10.7 billion in the next seven years, with a CAGR of 33.6

%, making the industry one among the best where applications of RPA can be observed. 

● ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION IN SUPPLY CHAIN

MANAGEMENT 

RPA in Supply Chain is expected to have a significant influence on the business process

industry in areas of production, efficiency, and precision. In the supply chain, Robotic

Process Automation is employed to automate processes that are now performed manually,

leaving minimal possibility for errors and aberrations. Instead of monotonous tedious tasks,

firms will be able to recruit and educate employees for problem-solving and brainstorming
assignments leveraging robots. Furthermore, studies have shown that Robotic Process

Automation has achieved a 43 % reduction in time for processes like credit, collections,

invoicing etc. Despite the fact that Robotic Process Automation is still in its adolescence in

supply chain operations, companies are moving quickly to automate their supply chains in

order to make them more compact and productive. However, the industry will soon be an

exceptional example of the best applications of RPA. 

● ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION FOR CUSTOMER

SERVICE

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) improves and enhances customer service by reducing

administrative workload. Customer service is sped up with software robots that gather data

and documents from various systems, handle service requests, and update customer records.

Customer requests can be responded to more promptly, and user feedback and satisfaction

statistics can be better managed, thanks to robots. RPA also improves efficiency by assisting

in the collection of data and documents, as well as the updating of client data and requests.

Needless to say, customer service is one of the pivotal applications of RPA. 

Also read: Boosting Patient Experience with Process Automation

● ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION IN HUMAN RESOURCES

While not as well-known as other varieties of intelligent automation employed in HR, RPA is

gaining traction among HR professionals as additional use cases emerge.  RPA is currently

often used in HR to automate tasks including consolidating or reviewing datasets, issuing job

offer letters to candidates, onboarding new hires, enabling health plan registration, and even

making badges for conferences and special events. Furthermore, RPA can be leveraged in HR
to create purpose-built chatbots by combining it with machine learning and Natural Language

Processing (NLP). When employees require guidance or to register claims or papers, they can

connect with virtual assistants rather than a live worker. It has the potential to drastically

enhance the movement and veracity of information to individual employees across the

organisation, giving them easier access to data and ensuring that their claims are adjudicated

more promptly. Once again this bolsters the proposition that the applications of RPA are

limitless. 

Observing the rapid expansion and the rate at which firms across industries have

implemented RPA, it is apparent how RPA is forming the underpinning for modern business

operations in the digital world. The applications of RPA are expanding at an exponential rate

and businesses that do not adopt RPA and automation technologies are likely to fall behind in

2022 since they would not be able to compete on an equal footing. RPA is, without a doubt, a

revolutionary innovation that has and will continue to storm industries around the globe with

its visionary applications.

Top Use Cases Of RPA Implementation

● Telecommunications

● Banking

● Customer Care

● Insurance

● Healthcare

● Manufacturing

● Finance

● Property Management
 ● Retail

Robotic Process Automation allows industries to automate tasks across various systems. An

industry that implements RPA can automate its entire workflow, infrastructure, and other

backend processes, which are mostly labor-intensive and time-consuming.

Industries of all sizes can automate their tasks with robotic process automation that

completely eliminates the risks of human errors. Let us walk through the key use cases of

RPA implementation in various industry verticals:

RPA In Telecommunications

Speed, cost and technology are the three key factors when it comes to a telecommunications

company. Telecom companies can take advantage of RPA in the following key areas:

Improved Productivity and Scalability

The ability to handle large volumes of data makes the robotic process automation the best

suitable go-to-market strategy for the telecommunications industry. Being able to automate

back-office processes eliminates the need for employees to perform redundant tasks and

focus on other critical tasks.

First Call Resolution Benefits

RPA enables software bots to rapidly access data, thus helping the telecom agents address the

customer demands on their first call without having to perform repeated follow-ups. RPA

promotes FCR rates thus ensuring customer retention and loyalty.

Cost Reduction

The major cost reduction involved with implementing RPA in telecom is that the RPA

software license can be used for multiple processes. The implementation cost is also not as

high as that for ERP or Business Process management. Automating tasks also leads to

increased ROI.

RPA In Banking

Incorporating RPA  saves labor and operational costs in banks. It also reduces errors and

human tasks significantly. For instance, the processing cost reduces to 30% to 70% by

reducing the turnaround time with banking automation via RPA technology. The banking

sector can leverage RPA in the following ways:

Improved Customer Service

From customer on-boarding, verifying customer details to account and loan inquiry, RPA

helps banks reduces the turnaround time. This helps banks retain their customers and

maintain customer loyalty.

Automated Accounts Payable and Closure Processes

The Traditional process of AP involves gathering invoices from vendors using OCR (Optical

Character Recognition), validating the data in the fields thus provided and then processing it.

RPA automates this entire process and credits the amount automatically to the vendor’s

account.

RPA also sends automated notifications to customers prompting them to furnish necessary

documents and processes account closure functions with 100% accuracy.

Enabling KYC And Compliance In Banks

Statistics show that certain banks invest in KYC compliance figures that are close to $384

million every year. RPA is used to gather customer information, validate and process it.

Fewer FTEs and round-the-clock functioning improve productivity and the quality of the

compliance process.

Credit Card And Mortgage Processing

RPA speeds up the credit card dispatching process by automated background checks and

validation based on given rules and procedures. As with mortgage processing, banks have to

perform several scrutiny checks such as employment and credit history, etc. RPA

implementation speeds the entire process based on well-defined algorithms.

Fraud Detection

Potential frauds are identified before-hand with the advent of RPA. Automating has led to

banks being able to identify accounts that are likely to cause threats and flags them. Banks

can thus scrutinize these accounts and initiate fraud investigation.

RPA For Customer Care

Amongst the industries embracing RPA benefits, the customer care industry is no exception.

When it comes to rule-based redundant work, robotic process automation can be relied upon

by BPOs. The different RPA use cases in customer care are as follows:

Automated Data Exchange

Customer care executives operate in a data-driven world. Critical data about customers is

gathered and insights are drawn from it. RPA automates the entire process and helps save

time and costs by serving their customers better and faster.

Cost Control

 According to the Institute of Robotic Process Automation, adoption of RPA reduces

operating costs by 25-50%. Operating costs are reduced with RPA implementation by

allocating redundant tasks to these software bots. This also helps outsourcers and clients to

improve sales.

Accurate and Differentiated Workflows

With very less human intervention, the workflows are accurate and are performed at a fast

pace. Leaving repetitive tasks to be performed by the software bots, there is a minimum
number of the workforce engaged in the process. This not only brings more accuracy but also

avoids additional costs and saves time.

Offering differentiated and customized services to customers can be obtained by

implementing RPA in industrial operations. This helps to maintain customer loyalty.

RPA In Insurance

Collecting important data and automating repetitive tasks is essential for the insurance

industry. For ensuring a better customer experience, the insurance industry makes use of the

following RPA use cases:

Processing Claims

Studies have shown that processing claims using RPA processes it 75% faster than the

traditional approach. Paper-based processes are eliminated by RPA which improves the

quality and accuracy of the entire process.

Form Registration Process

Insurance automation with RPA speeds up the form registration process by 40%. RPA with

artificially intelligent systems reduces the workload significantly and ensures customer

satisfaction.

Regulatory Compliance Updates Made Simpler

Insurance firms rely on several compliance standards and policies. For instance, the HIPAA

privacy rules and PCI standards can vary and banks can help their clients stick to these

compliance standards by making use of automated notifications and updates using RPA

strategies.

Risk Mitigation

RPA allows risk mitigation via RPA by being able to accurately process data automatically

from both internal as well as external sites. This ensures delivery of work at a faster pace and

with 100% accuracy.

RPA In Healthcare Industries

With the growing volume of patients, healthcare industries are prioritizing on cost reduction

and efficiency as two major benefits of RPA implementation in healthcare services. The key

RPA use cases in healthcare are as follows:

Savings on Human Workforce

Replacing the workforce that performs mundane and repetitive tasks can be replaced with

RPA implementation. This helps the workforce from spending time on core activities rather

than perform intense and mundane tasks.

Increased Throughput With Improved Quality

Healthcare personnel can now tackle the large volume of patients, especially in providing

individual care and attention. Maintaining medical records of patients, entry processing,

claim processing, etc are automated with lower costs via RPA implementation.

RPA In Manufacturing Industries

Robotic process automation has made manufacturing companies shift their production units

to automated software bots. Assembling of products, quality checking and packaging and

back-end processes have obtained a 40% savings in operational costs via automation. The

major use cases are as follows:

BOM Made Simple

The Bill Of Materials with the list of raw materials for new product creation provides detailed

information. Leveraging RPA makes product creation faster and ensures accurate and timely

creation.

Data Migration

Unlike traditional data migration, implementing RPA provides proper planning and execution

of moving data from old to new systems, ensuring cost and time savings.
ERP Automation

Planning of resources is made easier with RPA implementation. Managing Inventory,

Accounts Payable, Receivable, and other reports are generated automatically.

Apart from these key areas, other industries that leverage robotic process automation

strategies are as follows:

RPA In Finance

Managing customer accounts, creating various reports, migrating data between accounts,

updating loan and mortgage data, etc are major applications

of RPA in the finance sector. RPA helps financial services meet compliance standards with

changing rules.

RPA technology is accurate and hence implementing RPA in financial services provide

significant risk reduction. Faster RPA cycles enhance finance processes, is highly scalable

and rapidly deployable.

RPA In Property Management

Property owners are able to manage their property units systematically with RPA. Automated

processes help property owners reduce the turnaround time, improve the efficiency of

business processes, and save costs.

RPA In Retail Sector

RPA provides the retail industries with solutions such as automatic inventory monitoring,

email sales, extraction of critical information from manufacturer websites, etc.

 8.RPA In Financial Service Industry: The Use Cases & Benefits

The Banking and Financial Service Industry is a process-oriented sector. If you happen to

see banking, it is the execution of the same set of activities and processes repeatedly. The

Repeating process becomes tedious and results in human errors and losses. However, with

the advancement of technology, banks, financial & insurance industries are applying

process automation in real-time and leveraging the risks involving high transactions and

minimizing the losses.

How Will RPA Benefit Banking & Financial Services?

Robotic Process Automation(RPA), allows organizations to automate repetitive tasks

and reduce the employee workload and contribute to the growth of the organization.
 The Robotic Process Automation In Banks & Finance Services

Application of Robotics in the field of banking and finance by primitively using an

effective robotic automation process software for end-user support, building AI-

significant Workforce and virtual assistance, is how RPA in the banking sector and

financial services are implemented.

RPA is a powerful tool addressing the critical need of banking and the RPA use cases in

financial services, assisting them in compliance operations with an increase in efficiency

and reduction in errors. Further banks and finance institutes implementing RPA are on an

exponential increase, with robotic process automation banks can reduce manual efforts,

assure better compliance, reduce risks and improvise the overall customer experience.

The RPA market will reach a $2.9 Billion by 2021, sources Forrester reports, the

expectations of deploying them in Banking, Financial Service & Insurance is high.

RPA In Banking Process: The Most Relevant Use Cases

The RPA in Banking Industry involves vast processes. However, considering how

the front-end service gets beneficial by RPA leaves us zero down on the following

seven most relevant places of RPA in banking use cases are listed below.

1. Essential In Credit Card Processing

In the traditional credit card application, the average waiting period to get the approval of

a credit card is about two to four business weeks. This long waiting time usually results

in customers getting frustrated and switching to other service providers. Significantly,

banks can reduce this by implementing RPA as it processes the application within hours.

The AI and Connected systems enable RPA bots to communicate in real-time to the

relevant and multiple systems, collect information from across systems, share, scrutinize

the application, run a background check in real-time, take decision abiding the strict rules

of approving or disapproving the application.

2. Critical Processing Of Mortgage Loan

In several countries, Banks have a time of minimum one to two month to process

mortgage loans. The checklist for approving the mortgage loan is long. However, with

RPA in the banking operations the application submission, loan process initiation,

application processing, verification of documents, eligibility credit score assessment and

allocation of loan is faster, say it can happen in 10-15 minutes. Faster process results in

happy customers.

3. Crucial Processing Of Fraud Detection

Digital banking has its drawback in the form of fraud. Many banks face it difficult in

tracking and identification of potential fraud transactions. However, with the benefits of

RPA in banking, tracking and flagging the potential fraud transaction with the negligence

delay response that too in real-time.

4. Getting To Know Your Customers- KYC Process

The most mandatory process for any banks is to know their valuable customers. The

highly data-driven process is the most dependent RPA use case in Banking. As RPA

implementation enhances the performance by running all relevant checks on customers

and validating on time at a reduced time and cost.

5. Processing Report Automation

Generating reports is an important aspect of the Banking system. Whether it is an

account tracking, suspicious activity tracing, or account and loan closures or be claim

request, the reports are mandatory. The RPA technology, along with the natural language
 processing technique, runs several checks over the documents, extracts the information,

based on simple predefined codes and produces the report.

6. In The Account Closure Process

Banks get some account closure requests every month, the reason can vary, but the large

customer base and multiple reasons also include non-submission of mandatory

documents by customers. In such cases, the robotic process automation easily tracks,

sends notification, filters and closes the inappropriate accounts saving time and efforts.

The benefits of RPA in financial services and banking is countless.

Cases for RPA uses

Financial transactions are the most frequent areas that require the RPA process. Such things

include processing sales orders, refunds, payrolls for employees, and invoicing.
The RPA can even help in comparing prices (ranges) between similar products or services.

Furthermore, the RPA use cases in financial transactions also include automating the

financial report generation processes.

The RPA application can also automate customer service responses. As a result, companies

that apply the RPA tools will shorten their times to generate leads for marketing purposes.

How does RPA work?

RPA mirrors the way people are accustomed to interacting with and thinking about software

applications. RPA's ability to copy the way humans perform a computer-based process has

contributed to its popularity compared with automation tools such as application

programming interfaces (APIs) or low-code development that are more scalable but less

intuitive or require expert knowledge to use.

The simplest RPA bots can be created by recording the clicks and keystrokes as a user

interacts with an app. When problems emerge, a user can simply watch how the bot is

connecting with the app and identify the steps that need to be fine-tuned.

In practice, these basic recordings often serve as a template for building more robust bots that

can adapt to changes in screen size, layout or workflows. More sophisticated RPA tools use

machine vision to interpret the icons and layout on the screen and make adjustments

accordingly.

Some RPA tools are also able to use these initial recordings to create hybrid RPA bots that

start by simply recording an existing workflow and then dynamically generating a workflow
automation on the back end. These kinds of hybrid bots take advantage of the simplicity of

RPA development and the scalability of native workflow automation.

In other RPA implementations, process mining and task mining tools are used to

automatically capture business process workflows that serve as starting templates for RPA

automations. The process mining can analyze the logs of ERP and CRM applications, for

example, to automatically generate a map of common enterprise processes. Task mining tools

use a locally running app with machine vision to capture a user's interactions across multiple

apps. All the major RPA vendors are starting to develop these kinds of process mining

integrations.RPA tools can also be connected to AI modules that have capabilities like OCR,

machine vision, natural langue understanding or decision engines, resulting in what is

called intelligent process automation. These capabilities are sometimes packaged

into cognitive automation modules designed support best practices for a particular industry or

business process.

Who is using RPA?

RPA is used in most industries, particularly those that include repetitive tasks such as

insurance, banking, finance, healthcare and telecommunications.RPA is used in finance to

automate governance, reconcile accounts or process invoices.RPA is used to automate

various supply chain processes, including data entry, predictive maintenance and after-sales

service support.Telecommunications companies use RPA to configure new services and the

associated billing systems for new accounts. Telco companies also use RPA to pull data from

multiple systems when triaging equipment outages or predicting problems.All the major

systems integrators, including Capgemini, Deloitte, EY, Genpact, Tata Consultancy Services

and Wipro, are using RPA to help build vertical applications that can make it easier for

companies to adopt best practices in their niche

 9.What are the challenges of RPA?

There are a number of challenges related to RPA, which have limited its use.

● Scalability. Enterprises have struggled to scale RPA automation initiatives

because, although RPA's software bots are relatively easy to implement, they can

be hard to govern and manage and therefore hard to scale.

● Limited abilities. While its name includes the words "process automation,"

many critics have pointed out that RPA software tools automate tasks. More work

is often required to stitch multiple tasks together into a process. Craig Le Clair, an

analyst at Forrester Research, has cautioned enterprises to observe the "rule of

five" in building RPA applications because they tend to break when a bot must

make more than five decisions, manipulate more than five apps or make more

than 500 clicks.

● Security. RPA bots sometimes need to access sensitive information to complete

their tasks. If they are compromised, they pose an additional security risk for

firms.

● Limited resiliency. RPA failures can occur when applications change in ways

that are not anticipated by developers.

● New QA issues. Bots require a variety of new QA practices to ensure they

continue to work as intended.

● Privacy. Bots may be involved in working with personally identifiable

information governed by privacy requirements. Teams need to ensure this data is

 processed in conformance with local data protection laws such as GDPR. For

example, if an RPA bot moved data outside of a given country without encryption

that would be a violation of Article 44 of GDPR. RPA vendors are starting to seek

ISO 27701 certification as a foundation for managing sensitive information.

● Efficiency. RPA bots manually plod through an application in the same way a

human does. This may not be as efficient as automating applications through

APIs or workflow automations baked into the application itself.

RPA can impact business operations?

● 40% – 60% savings

Institutions can save up to 40% – 60% processing time and cost

● Compliance Followed

Processes will be more compliant with almost zero errors and as the bot does not

make mistakes and follow rules

 ● Single View System

Legacy system integration reduces manual work of verifying information from

multiple systems and keep them updated

● No Infrastructure Cost

RPA implementation does not require any major changes in infrastructure with its UI

automation capabilities. RPA on Cloud further reduces the hardware and maintenance

cost.

10.Advantages and Disadvantages of RPA

Robotic Process Automation is a growing technology with several benefits. However, some

people still are not convinced of it and make objections. In this article, we have addressed

both sides (advantages and disadvantages) of RPA to give you a better understanding of this

technology.

Advantages of RPA

Some of the significant advantages of Robotic Process Automation software are given below:

Code-Free

RPA doesn't require any coding or programming knowledge. The modern RPA tools are used

to automate applications in any department where the clerical work is performed across an

enterprise. Hence, Employees only need to be trained on how RPA works, and they can easily

create bots, just through GUI (Graphical User Interface) and different intuitive wizards. It

gives an advantage over the traditional methods of automation and enables accelerated
delivery of business applications. Besides, this platform reduces the initial cost of installation,

training, and deployment.

Non-Disruptive

One of the major challenges that IT deployment faces is the risky or complex transformation

process, which prevents large organizations from redesigning, replacing, or enhancing the

running system. However, the transformation process in RPA is very simple and

straightforward. The RPA software robots follow the existing security, quality, and data

integrity standards to access the end-user system in the same manner as human beings. These

software robots also prevent disruption of any kind and maintain functionality and

protections.

User-Friendly

RPA does not require a special kind of knowledge, such as coding, programming, or deep IT

skills. RPA software is user-friendly, easy to understand, and easy to use. RPA tools allow

users to create bots quickly and effortlessly by capturing mouse clicks and keystrokes with a

built-in screen recorder component. Some of the RPA software includes the option to create

and edit bots manually using the Task Editor.

Rich-Analytical Suite

RPA software contains an in-built analytical suite that evaluates the performance of the robot

workflows. RPA analytical suite also helps in monitoring or managing the automated

functions from a central console, which can be accessed from anywhere. It offers basic

metrics on robots, workflows, and more. The analysis performed by the analytical suite helps
users to track the operations and determine issues. There is no need for any integration since

everything is inbuilt and set right out of the box.

Security

When an organization is running on automation, more users will demand access to RPA

products. Therefore, it is important to have robust user access management features. RPA

tools provide options to assign role-based security capabilities to ensure action specific

permissions. Furthermore, the entire automated data, audits, and instructions which can be

accessed by bots, are encrypted to avoid any malicious tampering. The enterprise RPA tools

also offer detailed statistics of the logging of users, their actions, as well as each executed

task. Thus, it ensures the internal security and maintains compliance with industry

regulations.

Rule-based Exception Handling

RPA system allows users to deploy bots using rules-based exception handling. This feature

proactively handles the exception. For example, RPA robot reports an exception, and then the

actions given below are triggered:

o The same process is re-assigned to a different bot by the server.

o The current bot retries the same process and removes the previous bot from

production.

o If retry is successful, the server maintains the reassignment and raises an alert to

report exception & resolution.

o If retry is unsuccessful, it stops the current bot and raises an alert to report exception

as well as failed resolution.

Hosting and Deployment Options

The RPA system provides deployment options across virtual machines, terminal services, and

cloud. Cloud deployment is one of the best among all the other deployment options, which

attracts most of the users due to its scalability and flexibility. Therefore, businesses can install

RPA tools on desktops and deploy it on servers to access data for completing repetitive tasks.

RPA systems can automatically deploy robots in a group of hundreds. Similarly, multiple

bots can be used to run different tasks within a single process while processing a high volume

of data.

Actionable Intelligence

This RPA feature refers to the ability to gain and apply knowledge as skills. Robots first

obtain the data and then convert it into information and transform the information into

actionable intelligence for the users. Artificial intelligence and cognitive intelligence are the

common features of RPA solutions that help bots to improve decision making over the

period.

Debugging

One of the biggest advantages of RPA from a development perspective is debugging. Some

RPA tools need to be stopped running while making changes and replicating the process. The

rest of the RPA tools allow dynamic interaction while debugging. It allows developers to test

different scenarios by changing the values of the variable without starting or stopping the

running process. This dynamic approach allows easy developments and resolution in a

production environment without requiring changes to the process.

Disadvantages of RPA
Some of the major drawbacks of Robotic Process Automation software are given below:

Potential Job Losses

If a robot can work faster with a more consistent rate, then it is assumed that there will be no

need for human input. It is the main concern for the employees, and this results as a major

threat to the labor market. However, this thinking is not accurate. Amazon has shown a great

example of this limitation. The employment rate has grown rapidly during a period where

they have increased the number of robots from 1000 to over 45000.

Initial Investment Costs

RPA is still in the stage of innovation, and so it can present challenges that may result in

unwanted outcomes. Therefore, it isn't easy for organizations to decide whether they should

invest in robotic automation or wait until its expansion. A comprehensive business case must

be developed when considering the implementation of this technology; otherwise, it will be

useless if returns are only marginal, which may not worth taking the risk.

Hiring Skilled Staff

Many organizations believe that to work with RPA, the staff must have significant technical

knowledge of automation as robots may require programming skills and an awareness of how

to operate them. It further forces organizations to either hire a skilled staff or train existing

employees to expand their skills.

An automation company can be a little beneficial during initial installation and set-up. But

the skilled staff can only adopt and manage the robots in the long-term.
Employee Resistance

People are usually habitual, and any change in the organization may cause stress to the

employees. People who are involved in new technology will get new responsibilities, and

they will have to learn new concepts of a specific technology. Because everyone may not

have the same level of knowledge, it may lead existing employees to resign from their job.

Process Selection

It is always best to choose tasks that are repetitive, rules-based, and do not require human

judgment. The non-standard processes are difficult to automate, and human interaction is

required to complete such processes. So, there are limited tasks that you can automate with

RPA.

12.Conclusion

As RPA brings more technologically-advanced solutions to businesses around the world,

operating models that adopt automation, whether in-house or offshored, will cut costs,

drive efficiency and improve quality Robotic Process Automation can play a critical role

by automating manual and time consuming mundane tasks. Automating such tasks reduces

error rate, turnaround time and improves productivity..

AutomationEdge is an integrated automation platform. It is being used by various banking

and financial institutions to automate complex IT and business processes which improves

employee productivity with 40% – 60% savings in processing time and cost. Read our

customer case studies here.

For more information on RPA in Banking and Financial Services Industry, get in

touch with us.

13.References

1. www.fintechjuice.com

2. www.wikipedia.org

3. www.scribd.com

4. www.einetech.com

5. www.kdnuggest.com

6. www.smartsheet.com