Empowering Branch Teams at National Bank of Malawi

The Challenge: Branch Teams Lacked the Tools to Act on Customer Feedback.

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With 32 service centres, 135 ATMs, and 812 FastServe Agents, National Bank of Malawi is the country’s largest commercial bank. Its frontline teams interact with thousands of customers daily, yet their ability to act on real-time customer feedback was limited.

The bank had multiple tools for measuring customer satisfaction (CSAT), but they all suffered from the same issues:
❌ Too few responses—not enough data to see real trends.
❌ No real-time insights—teams couldn’t react in the moment.
❌ Scattered reporting—data was collected but wasn’t centralized for easy analysis.

For branch teams, this meant waiting weeks—or even months—for insights that could improve customer service right now.

The Solution: Giving Branch Teams the Power to Improve Customer Experience.

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The bank shortlisted Ombea alongside other solutions. After a successful pilot, they extended Ombea for three years, rolling out:

🔹 On-the-spot feedback: Ombea's multiple collectors made it easy for customers to share feedback across the whole journey in-branch, helping staff react in real time.
🔹 Instant digital responses: Digital collectors allowed corporate and retail banking customers to give feedback from anywhere.
🔹 Live alerts for branch teams: Instead of waiting for reports, branch managers received instant notifications, allowing them to act immediately when service issues arose.
🔹 Team dashboards & leaderboards: A fun, transparent system encouraged healthy competition and motivated teams to improve customer experience.
🔹 Monthly reports with trends: Senior leadership could finally see clear patterns across all locations, helping them support frontline teams with data-driven decisions.

The Impact: Branch Teams Took Control of Customer Experience.

"The Ombea data is helping us to work closer with the team to increase CSAT and efficiency" - Lighton Mkwanda, Customer Insights & Business Information

Drawing from Lighton’s observations, the team saw a number of key improvements:
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✅ Faster response to customer needs – Teams used real-time alerts to open new cashier stations when wait times spiked.
✅ Smarter shift planning – Insights teams analyzed trends to adjust staffing levels at peak times, such as end-of-month banking rushes.
✅ Greater team engagement – With clear data and instant feedback, branch staff felt more empowered to improve customer experiences.
✅ Confidence in future changes – The bank is now rolling out Ombea web widgets to capture customer experience insights across online banking.

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Why It Worked.

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By giving branch teams ownership over customer experience and equipping them with real-time insights, National Bank of Malawi transformed the way it responds to customer needs. Instead of relying on delayed reports, frontline teams now make decisions in the moment—creating a more responsive, customer-focused banking experience.

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