How CRED is using AI to deliver concierge-like experiences for India’s affluent consumers

CRED, the Bengaluru-based members-only platform for creditworthy consumers, is deepening its use of artificial intelligence to scale its premium customer experience. Built around values of trust, security, and exceptional design, CRED’s latest AI-led initiatives aim to make its service more intuitive and personalised without compromising on quality.

Speaking on Executive Function, a series by OpenAI, Swamy Seetharaman of CRED explained how the company’s shift towards becoming an AI-first organisation is helping its teams move faster while maintaining the brand’s high standards.

“When we started, we were building for India’s most affluent households—a user base that expects trust, transparency, security, reliability, and exceptional design. These principles have guided us from day one,” Seetharaman said. “But as we grew—more products, more teams, more data—it became harder to maintain context and move quickly without compromising quality. The question we ask is, how do we make every single member in every function be 10X? For us, AI has become a huge unlock in that journey. It lets us move fast and stay right, without sacrificing our core principles.”

At the centre of this evolution is Cleo, CRED’s AI conversational companion built on OpenAI’s models, including GPT-4.0, GPT-5, and o3. Cleo engages with users in three key categories: informational, contextual, and transactional, classifying intent and generating accurate, empathetic responses.

To complement Cleo, CRED has also developed two internal AI-powered tools: Thea, which supports agents by summarising conversations and suggesting next steps, and Stark, which helps operations teams create or update standard operating procedures in minutes.

The results have been significant. “Broadly, we’ve had a 14 percentage point improvement in our CSAT scores. In the three months since launch, Cleo has reached a 98% resolution accuracy rate, with 18% more multi-intent conversations being resolved successfully. Average handling times have decreased across all three tools, and session drop-offs have fallen by 31%,” Seetharaman shared. “Together with Cleo, Thea, and Stark—tailored for customers, agents, and operations with the help of AI—we’re moving closer to our goal of creating a true concierge experience built on trust, reliability, security, and exceptional design.”

Looking ahead, CRED plans to expand Cleo’s capabilities across all business lines while using AI to detect “data dead-ends”—gaps in user support that can be instantly fed back to improve workflows.

Seetharaman believes that success in AI integration lies in aligning innovation with company values. “Every company must identify what’s most important whether it’s efficiency, effectiveness, or both, and then leverage AI in alignment with their values. For us, incorporating OpenAI’s technology has been a true unlock across two of our values: compounding and being fast and right. The early results are encouraging, and we’re focused on amplifying and scaling that impact.”