SOUTH HOLLAND, Ill. – Osama bin Laden isn't a member of Sherwin-Williams Employees Credit Union, but if he or any other known terrorist tried to join, the credit union would know, or can at least prove they tried. The $40 million institution is using a new, Web-based service called ConfirmIT from its core processor, IntegraSys. The system swiftly cross-references more than 23 billion records, allowing the credit union to both screen its lists of current and prospective members against government lists such as those connected with OFAC and FINCEN, and to look for potential fraudsters and others whose previous experience with other institutions would simply indicate they may not be a good risk to have aboard. "ConfirmIT verifies identity, screens government watch lists, stores transactional data and provides a customizable CIP (customer information program)," says Sara Brooks, senior vice president for strategy and offerings development at IntegraSys in Frisco, Texas. The Fiserv unit launched the product at its annual conference in September and already has about 80 credit unions signed on, Brooks says. "We've been using it since February. We've had some close matches, like the names Laden and Rodriguez, and had to go check. We found out our Rodriguez lived in Illinois and not Venezuela," says Ray Santare, president of Sherwin-Williams Employees CU (www.swcu.org). About a dozen of the credit union's 22 employees use the system, which IntegraSys (www.integrasys.fiserv.com) created in partnership with security specialist Penley Inc., and it has proven to be user friendly and cost efficient, Santare says. Santare says "the whole OFAC thing had been a tremendous burden for us. Looking for people on the list is one thing, but making sure you're in compliance and having the records to prove it is the biggest problem. This system generates the reports and records we need for that." Brooks says ConfirmIT "really fits in our strategy to help credit unions more accurately and consistently implement processes around the issues of security and fraud management. Credit unions already knew what they had to do with identity verifications, but what was not necessarily in place was a way to efficiently run through all the processes required, and to document what had been done. "This provides a very automated way for our client credit unions to ensure they're following their own policies." In addition to watching for suspected terrorists and international money-launderers and the like, the ConfirmIT tools also are useful for checking quickly whether prospective members have had accounts closed at other institutions or could present identity verification problems. "It's automated a lot for us that we had to do on paper before," Santare says. "For instance, we know what Illinois and Indiana driver's licenses look like, but someone comes in here with one from another state? We're not so sure what a Florida license should look like. Now we have databases to check against and don't have look things like that up in books." The credit union, which now has about 8,900 members, is considering seeking a community charter, Santare says, and would need such tools for handling the expanded base of membership if they weren't already in place now. "I belong to the school of thought that says you have to have certain things in place to go for a community charter, and without this kind of service, I don't think we could do it," he says. -

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