PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A new study released by Aite Group focusing on online account opening revealed that 60% of the top 20 credit unions (based on assets) offer online account opening, a 35% spike over the previous year. However, only 42% of those that have instituted online account opening also offer online funding. By comparison, 80% of the top 20 banks (based on assets) offer online account opening and of those, 87% also provide online funding opportunities.

The availability of online account opening is often driven by costs, the report read. Aite Group estimated a per-case cost of $15 for online account opening and $65 per-case cost for traditional, manual processes.

For large credit unions, the report posed, if 3% of the eligible cases went through the online account opening process, the $50 savings per case would generate $50,625. If 20% of the eligible cases went through the online account opening process, the $50 savings per case would result in $337,500. "Credit unions are typically smaller institutions with limited geographic reach, so a higher percentage of new account opening takes place online," the report said. "It makes sense that larger credit unions will address this issue first, but assuming that a compelling business case can be made, there could be a lot of demand for these systems among smaller credit unions [and banks] in the near future. In fact, several vendors we spoke with said they are experiencing a burst of activity from mid-sized and smaller credit unions. A factor driving this increased activity includes the fact that credit union core systems tend to be newer and feature more accessible, real-time integration capabilities."