How People's Bank is bringing AI to the front line of banking
Financial services
A Bank Built on Reach
People's Bank is the second largest commercial bank in Sri Lanka, with one of the widest branch networks in the country. Millions of customers rely on it for everyday banking, from savings accounts to loans to day to day transactions, often through a branch that has served their family for years.
That scale comes with an expectation that goes beyond the branch counter. Customers increasingly expect the same reliability they associate with People's Bank to be there the moment they open a browser, not only when they walk through a branch door or wait on hold with a call center. The question for a bank of this size is how to meet that expectation without asking more of already stretched frontline teams, and without compromising the security standards that come with handling financial data.
Where the Time Goes
Every day, People's Bank's frontline channels field the same recurring questions. What savings account options are available. What a specific product covers. How a service works, or what documents are needed to apply for one. None of these questions are complex on their own, but at the scale of a bank with a nationwide branch network, they add up quickly.
Each of these routine conversations pulls time away from the customers who need more, the ones with a dispute to resolve, a loan to structure, or a relationship to manage. Call centers and branch staff end up spending a meaningful share of their day repeating the same answers, rather than focusing on the interactions where a human is actually needed.
What People's Bank needed was a way to answer these everyday questions instantly and accurately, using real product information rather than a static FAQ page, while keeping customer data secure within an environment that meets the standards expected of a regulated financial institution.
Why BotCircuits
BotCircuits worked with the People's Bank team to design an approach shaped by the realities of deploying AI inside a bank.
Connected to core banking.
Rather than working off a fixed script, the concierge draws directly from People's Bank's core banking systems, so its answers to product and account related questions stay accurate as offerings change.
On premise architecture.
Financial data carries regulatory requirements that most customer service data does not. BotCircuits built the solution to run on premise, so customer information stays inside People's Bank's own infrastructure rather than a shared cloud environment.
A path to a human, not a dead end.
Banking is full of questions that need judgment rather than a script. The concierge is paired with BotCircuits Helpdesk, so any question it cannot resolve is handed to a live agent instead of leaving the customer stuck.
A platform built for BFSI.
BotCircuits is built around banking and financial services use cases from the ground up, rather than adapted from a generic customer service tool.
Designed to expand.
The web concierge is the first phase of a two phase engagement, built on a platform that extends naturally to new channels rather than requiring a separate system for each one.
Meeting Customers Where They Already Are
The engagement is being delivered in two phases.
Phase 1
The AI Concierge. Deployed on the People's Bank website, the concierge handles the frontline questions that make up most day to day customer conversations.
Answers questions on savings account options and general product details
Responds to common service and process questions
Draws on core banking data so answers reflect actual product information
Hands off to a live agent through BotCircuits Helpdesk whenever a question falls outside its scope
Runs on premise to meet the bank's data security requirements
Phase 2
WhatsApp banking. The same concierge capabilities extend to WhatsApp, meeting customers on a channel many of them already use every day for everything else in their lives, without requiring a separate app or a branch visit for a simple question.
For People's Bank's service teams, the concierge means fewer repetitive conversations and more time for the customers who need a human. For customers, it means an answer to a basic banking question is available the moment they ask, on the channel they already have open.
