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A Golden Opportunity
When the last remaining community bank on this San Francisco Bay island was purchased by a national “big bank,” the residents of Alameda faced a personal service void that proved to be a golden opportunity for the founders of the Bank of Alameda.
The timing and conditions were perfect to open a de novo bank. With a mission to provide quality, customer-centric service to a tight-knit community, the bank opened its doors in 1998, and has grown to include five branch locations and assets of $250 million. With a strong community bank presence on the island and a thriving commercial loan business on the mainland, Bank of Alameda is well on its way to reaching its goal of $500 million in assets within the next three to four years.
Progressive Technology Partnership
When selecting a core software provider, Bank of Alameda looked first for the basics, but they knew Internet banking was becoming a bigger factor, and that they wanted to excel at serving commercial customers. “We also wanted something that would handle all of our business, from the small details on up, without having to change it in five or ten years just because the software couldn’t handle our anticipated growth,” explains Michael Roberts, Bank of Alameda Executive Vice President and CIO.
In the end, they chose Fiserv to provide the integration and system scalability the bank needed. “The solutions from Fiserv have enabled us to be both a community bank and a business bank, without having to change software,” says Roberts. “They’ve really been a key part of our success.”
Outsourcing Makes Sense
Looking for a strong core software package that would be easy to use for both staff and customers, Bank of Alameda chose the Premier® suite of solutions from industry leader Information Technology, Inc. (ITI), a unit of Fiserv. “Premier’s open architecture and flexible technology have been a big part of what we’ve been able to achieve,” explains Roberts. “Its inherent scalability makes it far superior to the other systems we reviewed.”
The bank elected to run Premier in an outsourced environment through the Fiserv ITI Outsourcing data center in Chatsworth, California. “We were looking at significant in-house hardware and facilities costs that we didn’t want to take on when we were beginning as a de novo. By using Premier in an outsourced capacity, we pay as we grow, and that makes good sense to us.”
Integrating the Essentials
At the heart of the decision to deploy Premier was the variety of fully integrated products that enhance bank services. “Customer service and support are very important to us,” explains Roberts. “For consumer Internet banking, Premierecom streamlines banking for both our customers and the bank. Likewise, Premierecorp’s ability to view statements online is great for our business Internet banking customers. They can pull up online activity throughout the day and see exactly what’s happening with their accounts.”
From an internal perspective, Premier has streamlined the way the bank does business. “ITI’s Premier Director document management applications have been a great savings for us. We’ve put all our loan files online, and now our loan officers can pull up a customer’s profile at any branch, island or mainland, and we can successfully compete with much bigger banks.” The bank has also been able to grow as a high-tech, high-touch organization by using Fiserv EFT for their ATMs, Fiserv Personix for their cards, Fiserv eSolutions for Web hosting and Fiserv IP for item processing services.
In Good Hands
Bank of Alameda is confident in their future growth plans because they have a technology partner who’s ready to grow with them. “Every time new technology becomes available, or we’re in need of a solution to better meet our customers’ needs, Fiserv already has it. And instead of the bank trying to figure out what is needed and what software will do the job, they can do that too.” In addition, Roberts says Fiserv’s people have been invaluable during the planning processes. “This level of service is one of the fundamental reasons we chose Fiserv.”
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