HBL — Habib Bank Limited — is Pakistan's largest bank by assets, with operations across more than 25 countries. When they brought me in, the mandate was product development across their digital channels: HBL Mobile, HBL Internet Banking, and HBL WhatsApp Banking. The engagement started with a rapid 10-week audit of where each channel stood — and moved directly into delivery.
This wasn't a report-and-leave engagement. The audit produced a 60+ item prioritised backlog that went straight into product planning. Two of the highest-priority items — Pakistan's first instant car loan approval via mobile, and a financial transaction capability through WhatsApp — were developed and delivered within the same mandate.
Three Channels, One Assessment
Each channel had a different maturity level, a different set of problems, and a different set of stakeholders. The audit had to assess all three simultaneously — and produce findings that were specific to each without losing sight of how they fit together as a customer experience.
What Was Actually Broken
Audits surface different things depending on where you look. The HBL assessment identified four distinct problem categories — each requiring a different type of fix.
The Cross-Entity Problem
Operating across Pakistan and UAE meant that two customer segments — domestic and diaspora — were using what was nominally the same product but experiencing materially different things. Closing that gap wasn't just a product consistency exercise; it was a customer trust issue.
- Full feature breadth across Mobile and Internet Banking — but shallow depth on key journeys
- Several high-traffic features unchanged since inception
- Mobile-only features creating IB parity gap for desktop customers
- Widget ecosystem (food, ticketing, doctor consultation) inconsistently integrated
- RDA account opening routing to corporate website — not native in-app
- Car loan process entirely paper-based — digital transition opportunity
- Overseas/diaspora segment (NRP/RDA) with distinct needs — underserved
- FCY transfer capability present but onboarding into the feature high-friction
- Repatriation request flow critical for diaspora customers — under-optimised
- Credit card and car loan requests for Pakistan-based family — unique use case, poor UX
- CDC account opening and fund transfer journey incomplete
- Inconsistencies with Pakistan entity creating visible service gaps for cross-border customers
"A customer using HBL in Karachi and then in Dubai should encounter the same bank. Closing cross-entity gaps isn't a product exercise — it's how you keep customers when they move."
Two Specific Deliveries
Within the 10-week mandate, two projects went beyond audit findings into active product delivery. Both were identified as high-priority, high-visibility opportunities that HBL could move on immediately.
The car loan application process at HBL was entirely paper-based. A customer who wanted a car loan filled out a physical form, submitted documents at a branch, and waited. The mobile channel didn't exist in this journey at all — not as a form submission point, not as a status tracker, not as a communication channel.
The project transitioned this end-to-end: from paper application to in-app submission, from branch-dependent processing to a digital decisioning flow, and from manual communication to in-app and notification-based status updates. The result was Pakistan's first instant car loan approval process in the banking sector — entirely through HBL Mobile. The phrase "instant" is meaningful here: the decisioning logic was built to give pre-qualified customers an approval response within the session, not after a waiting period.
✓ Pakistan's first instant car loan approval via mobileWhatsApp Banking existed at HBL as an informational channel — customers could get account information, check balances, and receive notifications. The open question was whether and how to enable actual financial transactions through WhatsApp.
This is a non-trivial product problem. WhatsApp is not a banking interface. It has no native authentication layer, no transaction confirmation framework, and no built-in regulatory compliance posture. The work involved designing the product architecture for how financial transactions could flow through WhatsApp in a way that was secure, met State Bank of Pakistan regulatory requirements, and was actually simple enough to use — which is the whole point of WhatsApp as a channel in the first place. The engagement provided the framework and implementation guidance that moved the capability from concept to proof of concept.
✓ Financial transaction POC — WhatsApp BankingThe Backlog Structure
The 60+ item backlog was built for immediate use — not as a document but as a delivery plan. Every item carried a current state description, a specific gap definition, a recommended resolution, and a sequencing rationale. Items were prioritised across three bands:
Sequencing logic was driven by three factors: impact on the customer (high-frequency journey vs niche feature), implementation effort (configuration change vs multi-sprint build), and dependency (does this require something else first?). Items that scored high on impact and low on effort went to Priority 1 — not because they were complex, but because they would move the needle fastest.
Where It Landed
The backlog was delivered to HBL's senior digital leadership, structured for immediate use in delivery planning. The car loan project set a market precedent — first instant approval via mobile in Pakistan's banking sector. The WhatsApp Banking work moved a new channel from concept to proof of concept with a clear path to transactional capability. And the cross-entity gap analysis gave HBL a clear picture of where Pakistan and UAE had diverged — and what it would take to close that gap for diaspora customers.
What This Means for You
If your bank is running digital channels that were built incrementally and have never been assessed end-to-end, here is what a useful engagement looks like:
What good digital channel product development requires
- Start with a complete feature inventory — verified, not assumed. Internal feature registers are often wrong or out of date.
- Assess each gap against a specific standard — "this feature hasn't been updated since inception" is a starting point, not a finding. The finding is what that means for the customer at that point in the journey.
- Treat onboarding friction as a revenue problem, not a UX problem. Every customer who drops off during registration or activation is a customer you paid to acquire and didn't convert.
- Cross-entity gaps are invisible from inside a single entity. If you operate in multiple markets, the gaps will only surface when a customer crosses them.
- New channels (WhatsApp, voice, embedded) need a product architecture before they need features. The question of how to do it safely and compliantly comes before the question of what to offer.