Yorkshire Building Society: From ad-hoc to systematic CX, creating a ‘Simply Brilliant’ Savings experience

YBS had a bold aim to create a customer-led culture, but their current approach of mapping journeys was ad-hoc and tactical. In addition, with a declining savings book, YBS needed to act fast to sustain their business. We worked with the team to begin systematically improving customer experience through the implementation of a simple, robust and repeatable approach to customer journey management.

12 point annual rise for NPS overall and 10 point in Savings NPS

(up from previous years average of +3)

Contributing to 18% growth in the savings book within one year

The Challenge

In 2018, YBS was at an exciting time in its history, with a new CEO and clear strategy that identified customer experience as a priority.

This meant a renewed focus on creating a customer-led culture, breaking out of traditional silos to do the right thing for customers, with internal behaviours to match.

In addition, the savings book at YBS was beginning to suffer with an ageing customer base and declining balances. To sustain the business in the long term, they needed to attract more customers, lower drop-out rates during sign-up and create an experience that customers were delighted by.

The Insight

Customer journey management was identified as crucial in developing the culture, but some barriers were getting in the way:

• Journey mapping was ad-hoc and tactical, without ongoing management or governance

• Effort was prioritised by leadership opinion, not by value to customers and the business

• The business relied on external support in this area, rather than building their own capability

• They lacked a deep understanding of the mortgage and savings customer journeys

• There was no senior buy-in or a single version of the truth

The Solution

Working collaboratively with the team, we designed a simple, robust and repeatable approach to customer journey management.

Three Savings journeys were mapped, that led to several ideas being implemented:

• A training programme that gave 93% of colleagues account opening skills (from 40%), enabling walk-in openings and leading to the highest ever levels of account openings

• The new process reduced time to open accounts from 45 mins to 12.5 mins, by removing red tape and automating key processes

• New channels including telephone and webchat were opened up, whilst making all accounts more online-friendly – reducing cost to serve

The Result

The overall CJM approach was endorsed by the Exec work began to prioritise and assess journeys using the framework.

This Savings work was completed in early 2018 and implementation began later that year. By the end of 2020, YBS saw a 10 point rise in NPS (up from previous annual averages of +3), and an 18% growth in the savings book.

Crucially, the experience shifted from one led by YBS red tape and processes, to a customer-led approach that worked for both colleagues and the customers they served. They proved that by doing the right thing for customers, commercial value would follow.

This was made possible by assessing the colleague journey and commercial impact too, not just the generic customer one.