Big data at HDFC Bank?

I had a bit of a creepy moment today – I must admit that, despite being a “data guy” and recommending clients to use data to make superior decisions (including customisations), it does appear creepy when you as a customer figure that your service provider has used data to customise your experience.

I’m in Barcelona, and wanted to withdraw cash from my Citibank account in India. Withdrew once, but when I wanted to withdraw more, the transaction didn’t go through (this happened multiple times, at multiple ATMs).

Frustrated, I figured that this might be due to some limits (on how much I could transact per day), and then decided to get around the limitations by transferring some money to my HDFC Bank account (since I’m carrying that debit card as well).

An hour after I’d transferred the money by IMPS, I put my HDFC Debit Card in my wallet and walk out, when I see an email from the bank informing me that my Debit Card is valid only in India, and with a link through which I could activate international transactions on it.

I’d never received such emails from HDFC Bank before, so this was surely in the “creepy” category. It might have been sent to me by the bank at “random”, but the odds of that are extremely low. So how did the bank anticipate that I might want to use my debit card here, and send me this email?

I have one possible explanation, and if this is indeed the case, I would be very very impressed with HDFC Bank. Apart from my debit card, I also have a credit card from HDFC Bank, which I’ve been using fairly regularly during my time in Europe (that my only other credit card is an AmEx, which is hardly accepted in Europe, makes this inevitable).

My last transaction on this credit card was to pay for lunch today, and so if HDFC Bank is tracking my transactions there, it knows that I’m currently in Europe (given the large number of EUR transactions recently, if not anything else).

Maybe the bank figured out that if I’m abroad, and have transferred money by IMPS (which implies urgency) into my account, then it is for the purpose of using my debit card here? And hence they sent me the email?

The counterargument to this is that this is not the first time I’ve IMPSd to my HDFC Bank account during this trip – the Income Tax and Service Tax websites don’t accept Citibank, so I routinely transfer to HDFC to make my tax payments. So my argument is not watertight.

Yet, if the above explanation as to why HDFC Bank guessed I was going to use my debit card is true, then there are several things that HDFC Bank has got right:

1. Linkage between my bank account and credit card. While I’ve associated both with the same customer ID, my experience with legacy systems in Indian financial institutions means actually associating them is really impressive
2. Tracking of my transactions on my credit card to know my whereabouts. If HDFC has done a diligent job of this, they know where exactly I’ve been over the last few months (provided I’ve used my card in these destinations of course).
3. Understanding why I use my account. While I’ve IMPSd several times in the past (as explained above), it’s all been in either the “service tax season” or “advance/self-assessment income tax season”. Mid-May is neither. So maybe HDFC Bank is guessing that this time it may not be for tax reasons?
4. Recognising I might want to use my debit card. If I’ve put money into my account and it’s not tax season, maybe they recognised I might want to use my debit card?

Maybe I might be giving them too much credit, and it just happened that the randomly sent out email came at the time when I’d just put the money into the account.

And the link they sent to enable international transactions worked! I had to use my laptop (it didn’t work on either the app or mobile web, so that’s one point deducted for them), but with a few clicks after logging into my bank account, I was able to enable the transactions!

So maybe there is reason to be impressed!