SAN JOSE, Calif. — The do-it-yourselfers at Technology Credit Union are now ramping up their move into business services.
The $1.2 billion CU says it is using a best-of-breed approach to cobble together a suite of offerings aimed at providing everything entrepreneurs would want from a big bank, only at less cost and with more personalized service.
"Our niche is focusing on existing members first and on small businesses that don't offer enough business to get through the door at large financial institutions," says Kathy Litman, vice president of marketing at the 72,000-member CU. "We're finding the best ways to meet their needs right here at their own credit union."
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At the core of the new package is Tech CU's core processor, Summit Information Systems. Tech CU is using several components from Summit's business services software suite, including detailed account analysis for internal tracking of account activity and fee-setting, flexible fee scheduling options, custom and pre-designed statement and report options and comprehensive account information features.
To fill in the gaps, the CU is adding cash management from Certegy, debit card processing with Metavante, Newtek for SBA lending referrals and other third-party services such as payroll management, merchant cards and credit card processing.
Leading up to the latest effort, the credit union already had been offering a basic, widely used business account system called DBA and then moved into apartment loans, processed through a solution from FICS, followed by business MasterCards from MBNA and auto loans last year. Expanding into a wide range of new offerings posed new challenges, however. "We began with a soft launch in April, which allowed us to work the kinks out before we went with our hard launch in July," says Sarah Samuel, assistant vice president of business services at Tech CU. Tech CU ramped up the program by first putting key people through extensive training on the business software module and then taking that knowledge back to their departments, along with extensive testing of such functions as pushing out statements. Litman adds, "We're lucky that we have someone here who's been working with our Summit system for many years. He's our guru on that, and whatever we can't do ourselves, we go to the best third-party provider we can."
A month after the hard launch, which included the initial marketing of the expanded services, the CU had about 100 business accounts under the new system, a number expected to grow quickly as the credit union's 1,500 existing DBA accounts are converted.
"Those 100 accounts are brand-new business, people who walked through the door," Litman says. Tech CU's business-services users are engaged in a wide range of activity, from landscaping services to mom-and-pop restaurants to, of course, high- tech startups.
Services to those enterprising members will continue to be expanded.
"We're going to keep sitting down with our members and saying, 'OK, six months from now, what do you think you'll need from us? And we're going to find the best way to deliver it," Samuel says. –[email protected]
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