As banks across Europe intensify efforts to reduce software defects, strengthen operational resilience and prove control over complex, multi-system processes, Postbank Bulgaria has turned to automation to eliminate errors in one of its most quality-critical areas: loan administration.
The bank has deployed robotic process automation (RPA) to enforce consistent, rules-based execution across high-volume workflows, cutting processing times sharply while driving error rates to zero.
The company’s drive is an active effort to strengthen its operational resilience as European banks face rising DORA-driven scrutiny.
Postbank Bulgaria, legally known as Eurobank Bulgaria AD, is one of the leading banks in Bulgaria and the country’s third-largest player in the loans and deposits market.
Headquartered in Sofia, the bank operates across retail and wholesale banking, offering credit and debit cards, mortgage and consumer lending, savings products and a broad range of corporate banking services for businesses active in the Bulgarian market.
With one of the most developed branch networks and alternative banking channels in the country, Postbank occupies a strategic position in both consumer and corporate financial services.
Modernisation drive
As part of its long-term modernisation strategy, the bank selected Service Centrix as an implementation partner to introduce the RPA platform of global software tester UiPath into its internal operations, according to a detailed case study published on UiPath’s website.
The objective was to streamline critical back-office processes while maintaining service quality and minimising risk to core banking systems.
The initiative began with a proof of concept focused on a single repetitive process, which quickly demonstrated that software robots could deliver consistent execution and measurable quality improvements without the disruption associated with traditional system redevelopment.
Following the initial proof of concept, Postbank identified 20 processes within its Loan Administration Division for automation, all of which were delivered within six months.
Postbank’s head office in the city of Sofia, Bulgaria
One of the most business-critical processes involved distributing incoming credit card payments to the correct customer accounts, including cases where customers held multiple accounts.
Many of these workflows had previously relied on manual data entry, cross-system checks and human judgement under time pressure, creating both operational bottlenecks and quality risks.
The task was defined by high transaction volumes and a zero-error tolerance, yet before automation it required seven employees working around four hours per day and still produced an average error rate of approximately five percent.
After automation, a single software robot was able to complete the majority of daily transactions in around two and a half hours, successfully processing roughly 95 percent of payments without errors and routing the remaining exceptions for controlled human review.
Processing times were reduced by around 80 percent, error rates fell to zero, and staff were freed to focus on higher-value activities.
The remaining automated workflows covered a wide range of back-office functions, including collecting customer data from public registries, uploading information into internal systems, processing fees, validating data, generating documents from templates and updating reports using inputs from multiple sources.
Today, six software robots execute these processes under the control of a central orchestrator, with most workflows triggered automatically according to business schedules.
For QA and software testing teams, the project illustrates how automation can act as a quality control layer across complex and partially legacy environments.
Postbank estimates that automating the same processes through conventional development would have required significant changes to core systems, introducing longer testing cycles, higher delivery risk and greater dependency on scarce engineering resources.
“When [RPA] is used in a smart way, taking into consideration all factors and constrains, it can provide huge benefits to any financial organisation.”
– Belyan Belchev
By contrast, the RPA approach delivered rapid improvements in consistency, auditability and defect reduction, argued Belyan Belchev, head of loan administration at Postbank.
He stressed in the case study on UiPath’s website that “RPA is a powerful tool for automation and optimisation of processes, both back-end and front-end, and when used in a smart way, taking into consideration all factors and constrains, it can provide huge benefits to any financial organisation.”
Belchev expects the initiative to deliver a two-to-one return on investment within two years, driven by lower rework, faster execution and improved capacity utilisation.
The software-based nature of the solution also supports scalability, allowing transaction growth to be absorbed by adding robots rather than increasing operational complexity or risk.
Beyond efficiency gains, the automation programme aligns closely with the regulatory direction set by the EU’s Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA), the regulatory framework that came into force in 2025.
By enforcing consistent execution, reducing manual intervention and providing clearer operational traceability, the automated workflows strengthen Postbank’s ability to demonstrate control over ICT-supported processes, a core requirement under DORA. Faster, error-free execution also supports more reliable incident prevention and easier root-cause analysis when issues do occur.
From a digital resilience perspective, the use of centrally orchestrated software robots improves visibility over critical processes and reduces dependency on individual staff knowledge, supporting business continuity and operational stability.
For banks preparing for DORA-led supervisory scrutiny, Postbank’s experience highlights how targeted automation can support compliance objectives while simultaneously improving software quality, operational resilience and employee experience.
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