NatWest has improved efficiency in its marketing and communications operations, cutting approval times for marketing content by 80 per cent.

Through a new partnership with Adclear, a UK-based AI-driven compliance infrastructure firm focused on the financial services industry, the bank has deployed Adclear’s compliance checks within its marketing approvals process.

The move is part of a wider push by NatWest to centralise its product marketing across current accounts, credit cards, loans, mortgages and savings.

Adclear said it combines NatWest's disparate marketing infrastructure across these channels into a unified platform, through which users can screen content in real time and flag where output does not meet regulation prior to launch.

The new offering is embedded in NatWest's Workfront workflow system, with the aim of giving all the bank’s compliance workers a consistent review process.

In a post on the partnership, Adclear noted that the FCA has doubled its interventions on financial promotions at the same time as compliance teams are working to review every piece of external marketing.

The firm added that manual compliance reviews can delay marketing campaign launches by up to five days, with slowdowns directly correlated to

NatWest’s adoption of Adclear is being supported by Accenture, with which the bank has an ongoing five-year data and AI transformation initiative.

Matthew Harwood, head of marketing and engagement platforms at NatWest, said: “Adclear has helped us turn compliance from something that slowed marketing down into something that actively supports how fast we can move.

“Cutting our approval times by 80% has let our teams focus on producing better, more relevant content rather than waiting on sign-off, and that speed is now a genuine advantage in how quickly we can get campaigns to customers. This is exactly the kind of technology-led transformation we want running across the bank.”

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