Gartner predicts that by 2028, 33% of enterprise software applications will include agentic AI, enabling 15% of routine decisions to be made autonomously. Customers are ready too: Capgemini predicts that 76% of banking customers expect AI-driven personalization as part of their digital experience. The need has clearly shifted toward Agentic AI, which can adapt in real-time and enable enterprise-wide intelligence.
This progression from simple virtual agents to sophisticated Agentic AI means BFS institutions are no longer limited to answering queries or generating summaries with AI. Instead, they can autonomously resolve escalations and accomplish end-to-end servicing with minimal human touch.
ServiceNow’s revolutionary AI platform has been gaining rapid adoption, accelerating this progression. It empowers banking and financial services organizations to leverage purpose-built modules and tools to upgrade from traditional automation to Agentic AI-based orchestration. ServiceNow Agentic AI workflows enable an iterative and interactive approach to automation, where the AI agent can engage in a more dynamic and self-reflective process, with minimal or no human intervention.
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How ServiceNow Agentic AI Addresses Banking and Financial Services Challenges
Customers expect hyper-personalized services and prompt resolutions in a highly productive environment. In the BFS sector, a significant portion of investment and resources goes into coordinating multiple systems and streamlining operations. BFS organizations must constantly juggle:
- Frustrating AI self-service experiences
- Unmanageable contact center volumes
- Fragmented customer insights due to disconnected data
- Manual, repetitive processes that extend resolution timelines and inflate operational costs.
All of these challenges complicate customer journeys, impacting loyalty and growth.
According to a McKinsey study, 71% of customers expect personalized interactions, and 76% get frustrated when they don’t receive them, switching banks. ServiceNow AI Agents, which are far more sophisticated than chatbots and AI assistants, emerge as a game-changer, transforming customer experience and business productivity.
When to Use Traditional AI vs Generative AI vs Agentic AI
The maturity of the workflow and level of automation required are some of the factors that determine the choice of type of AI for BFS organizations navigating the AI landscape. The right ServiceNow partner can help BFS organizations assess their AI-readiness and implement the right AI for the right processes at the right stage – all while ensuring low cost, compliance, and business continuity.
- Traditional AI is best when processes are highly regulated or require frequent human oversight, such as security-sensitive workflows. It focuses on automating repetitive, rule-based tasks but still relies on human intervention.
- Generative AI applies when humans require AI assistance to enhance efficiency in a pre-existing workflow, or when fine-tuning is required. It can learn from existing data and can generate knowledge articles, images, etc. that accelerate human decision-making. Learn more about how ServiceNow GenAI transforms businesses.
- Agentic AI is the next leap: it can trigger and manage complex, multi-step workflows while learning and adapting in real-time. Unlike virtual agents or GenAI that are assistive in nature, Agentic AI dynamically plans and acts during runtime. Its role is that of an operator/controller of a workflow that can autonomously execute desired tasks.
How does this help? – Financial institutions can now move from robotic process automation to adaptive workflows that evolve with customer and regulatory needs.
ServiceNow Agentic AI Across All Layers of BFS Operations
ServiceNow’s Agentic AI capabilities touch every layer of the banking operations, improving both customer experience and employee efficiency:
- Front Office (Customer-Facing): Conversational AI and virtual agents can support 24/7 customer interactions and deliver hyper-personalization through behavioral analysis. With ServiceNow’s AI-driven onboarding, identity verification, and KYC processes can be automated, ensuring frictionless customer journeys right from the beginning.
- Middle Office (Risk & Compliance): ServiceNow AI Agents can continuously monitor regulatory compliance and flag compliance risks early on. While advanced cybersecurity systems can detect threats in real time, organizations sometimes suffer from false positive fraud alerts. This can be mitigated with ServiceNow Agentic AI, which can save millions of dollars while strengthening customer trust.
- Back Office (IT & Operations): Case triage AI agents can classify, route, and validate documents automatically. With low-code tools like App Engine, teams can design compliant workflows and adapt quickly to changing regulations. This agility ensures IT and Operations stay ahead of disruptions, delivering consistent service at scale.
Real-World Use Cases
| Use Case | Challenge | How ServiceNow Agentic AI can help |
|---|---|---|
| Friendly Fraud Detection | According to Mastercard, 75% of chargebacks are friendly fraud. Such friendly fraud disputes impact employee productivity and result in significant additional costs. | ServiceNow AI agents can detect friendly fraud using behavioral signals, can automatically recommend next steps, and draft emails to the customer, significantly lowering Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR). |
| Smarter Case Triaging | Contact centers and back-office teams spend several hours in manual classification, routing, and documentation of cases, leading to huge backlogs and slow resolution. | AI agents can auto-validate documents, analyze customer intent, and classify cases. The agents are highly context-aware and perform escalations accurately, reducing case handoffs. |
| Personalized Customer Engagement and Cross-selling | Banks often struggle while personalizing services for individual customers, and struggle with identifying the right cross-selling opportunities. | Based on real-time transaction patterns and intent signals, AI agents can recommend personalized products even when the customer base is complex and large. AI agents can deliver timely and relevant products for cross-selling, enhancing customer loyalty, and retention. |
| Loan Fraud and Non-Performing Assets | Banks face high risks of loan fraud due to fake identities and false financial information. Non-performing assets (NPAs) also pose a significant threat to the financial sector due to weak risk assessment. | AI agents can automate document validation and cross-check customer details with external databases and flag anomalies. Continuous monitoring through the ServiceNow Risk Management (IRM) can help detect early warning signals of loan defaulters. This results in safer approvals and a reduction in NPAs through early intervention. |
Real-World Use Cases
| Use Case | Challenge | How ServiceNow Agentic AI can help |
|---|---|---|
| Friendly Fraud Detection | According to Mastercard, 75% of chargebacks are friendly fraud. Such friendly fraud disputes impact employee productivity and result in significant additional costs. | ServiceNow AI agents can detect friendly fraud using behavioral signals, can automatically recommend next steps, and draft emails to the customer, significantly lowering Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR). |
| Smarter Case Triaging | Contact centers and back-office teams spend several hours in manual classification, routing, and documentation of cases, leading to huge backlogs and slow resolution. | AI agents can auto-validate documents, analyze customer intent, and classify cases. The agents are highly context-aware and perform escalations accurately, reducing case handoffs. |
| Personalized Customer Engagement and Cross-selling | Banks often struggle while personalizing services for individual customers, and struggle with identifying the right cross-selling opportunities. | Based on real-time transaction patterns and intent signals, AI agents can recommend personalized products even when the customer base is complex and large. AI agents can deliver timely and relevant products for cross-selling, enhancing customer loyalty, and retention. |
| Loan Fraud and Non-Performing Assets | Banks face high risks of loan fraud due to fake identities and false financial information. Non-performing assets (NPAs) also pose a significant threat to the financial sector due to weak risk assessment. | AI agents can automate document validation and cross-check customer details with external databases and flag anomalies. Continuous monitoring through the ServiceNow Risk Management (IRM) can help detect early warning signals of loan defaulters. This results in safer approvals and a reduction in NPAs through early intervention. |
Ready to Ride the Next Wave of AI with ServiceNow Agentic AI for Banking and Financial Services?
As the financial services industry evolves, the key differentiator will be how quickly organizations adapt to new risks and harness evolving technologies. ServiceNow Agentic AI enables BFS organizations to scale with confidence, with emphasis on exceeding customer expectations. It is no surprise that 84% of banks expect to increase their AI investment over the next fiscal year, with early adopters reporting significant gains in efficiency and customer satisfaction.
Organizations embracing AI early will be the ones that can thrive and stay resilient in the ever-competitive and complex financial services market. With a trusted ServiceNow implementation partner like KANINI, BFS organizations can unlock the full potential of Agentic AI to turn every unique challenge into a new opportunity. Talk to our ServiceNow experts now.
Frequently Asked Questions
Agentic AI can take control of actions and act autonomously, while traditional AI mostly provides predictions and responds to human input. It can adapt and learn in real-time unlike traditional AI models which have a pre-defined set of abilities.
Agentic AI can continuously analyze patterns in real-time and can detect anomalies faster than traditional systems. This helps prevent fraud and reduce financial risks more effectively.
Yes, ServiceNow Agentic AI is designed with a user-friendly interface. With basic training, employees can start leveraging pre-built agents to automate tasks and test them before deployment.
Yes, ServiceNow Agentic AI can automate compliance checks and enhance audit-friendliness. It helps reduce manual effort and ensures timely compliance.
Author
Ravi Rajamani
Ravi is the ServiceNow Practice Lead at KANINI. He brings close to 18 years of experience in the IT industry and has strong program & project management skills spanning ServiceNow, Resource Management, Solution Design, and Service Delivery. He has a proven track record of helping enterprise customers leverage ServiceNow platform efficiently.
