State Bank of India (SBI) is rapidly increasing the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) including Generative AI and Agentic AI across various banking operations.
According to SBI, the bank is adopting generative and agentic AI on a large scale. Initiatives such as the ‘AskSBI’ chatbot for employees, agent-assistance chatbots for contact-center operations, and cheque processing automation are being implemented as part of this effort.
SBI is increasingly utilizing AI and automation technologies for critical functions such as fraud detection and prevention, risk management, anti-money laundering (AML), and check processing.
C. S. Setty stated that SBI’s entire cheque processing operation is being shifted to AI, he also explained that AI would primarily automate repetitive, high-volume, and rule-based tasks, rather than customer-facing activities.
It is expected that the use of AI will reduce the manual effort involved in day-to-day banking operations, allowing employees to dedicate their time to critical tasks that require human understanding and direct customer interaction. According to Sethi, the primary objective of AI is to automate repetitive, high-volume, and rule-based tasks, while the human role will remain central to activities involving direct customer engagement.
The increasing use of AI for customers is expected to accelerate the processing of banking services, improve fraud detection and transaction monitoring, and streamline day-to-day banking operations.
