HDFC Bank loan kiosks in offices soon

You can now apply for a personal loan during your lunch break, without stepping out of the office. If the paperwork is proper, you can also receive the money before you reach home at the end of the day.

HDFC Bank, India’s second-largest private sector lender, is setting up kiosks in corporate offices that would allow employees to submit a loan request, get it processed, and receive the money in 24 hours. “Initially, we are targeting companies that already have a banking relationship with us. We plan to set up 1,500 priority desks across 500 companies in nine cities in the next six months,” Sai Giridhar, senior vice-president and business manager (unsecured loans), HDFC Bank, told Business Standard.

The mobile kiosks would offer details of the bank’s personal loan products, including interest rates, tenure, and eligibility criteria. All the rates and fees would be similar to those of loans from bank branch.

An employee can visit the kiosks and submit an application form, which would immediately be scanned and uploaded to the bank’s central server. By the end of the day, the customer is told if his application has been approved. If approved, the money would be transferred to his account either on the same day, or early the following day.

As the bank already maintains salary accounts of the company’s staff, the customer would not have to submit documents verifying his identity, address, and monthly income.

HDFC Bank officials said this process would reduce the turnaround time for getting personal loans to one or two days. Currently, most banks take around two weeks to complete the process.

The move would allow the bank to cross-sell other products and services. “Our objective is to improve the customers’ experience and make the entire process hassle free,” Giridhar said.