Having opened a branch opposite the famous Sai Baba temple in Shirdi in March 2019, Suryoday Small Finance Bank (SSFB) is eyeing the possibility of leveraging this brick-and-mortar presence to offer its customers, especially high networth individuals and senior citizens, assistance with check-in at a local hotel and darshan.

Customer-retention

The Bank's team is exploring the aforementioned value adds as part of its customer retention strategy, aimed at ensuring that its customers have a hassle free visit to the temple town. Outstation visitors sometimes find hotel check-in and darshan (temple visit) daunting in Shirdi.

“Now, our team is working on what we can do for our existing customers when they travel to the temple-town. “Many of them will probably require a three-hour (day) check-in at a hotel just to freshen up. They wouldn’t want to take a room (for 24 hours).

“So, can we do a tie-up (with a local hotel). We want to explore this in terms of the Shirdi branch,” said R Baskar Babu, MD and CEO.

For HNI customers, SSFB is eyeing tie-ups for hotel accommodation, darshan, and food. As senior citizens constitute almost 40 per cent of SSFB’s deposit base, the bank believes that assistance with arrangements during their temple visit would go a long way in bringing smiles.

Referral arrangement

Suryoday SFB is also planning to enter into a referral arrangement with a big commercial bank, subject to Reserve Bank of India approval, whereby the requirement of larger-ticket-size home and auto loans of its non-microfinance customers will be met by the latter.

Under this arrangement, the bank will source such loans and pass them on to the partner bank.

“We cater to the regular customers. But we don’t do prime home loans and car loans. But many of our non-microfinance customers will have a requirement for all of that. So, we want to be a one-stop-shop in terms of originating these loans. We will not write these loans in our books.

“We will have a tie-up with a large private sector bank or a public sector bank. We will only source and pass on the leads to them.

“I think, the world is moving towards where we don’t need to be everything. We don’t have to manufacture all the products,” said Babu.