MECHANICSBURG, Pa. — Cash management may not be the most exciting topic in the financial services world, but what separates one organization from the next is how accurately it can track, forecast and inventory branch, ATM and vault cash.
"Our process was very manual. Each branch would figure out what was needed in cash and fax that order to the main office," said Members 1st Federal Credit Union's Retail Services Support Analyst Emily Zimmerman. "We then would consolidate them and order the cash in bulk — the process was very time consuming."
The $2.6 billion credit union, supporting 264,000 members in 59 branches, began implementing CetoLogic's C3 Financial solution in 2011.
With so many branches, Zimmerman explained that a few branches were selected at a time and then gradually more were added. The process usually lasted three weeks per branch and included training employees about how the system worked and how to navigate the software.
"During that process, the branch was asked to look at their cash and make a decision of what they normally would have ordered, and then they were to compare that to what Ceto was recommending," said Zimmerman. "Overall the branches would have ordered a total of $1.2 million more in cash then what was needed for that week."
While the software streamlined protocols, a new development has further increased efficiencies. CetoLogic recently announced an interface between C3 Financial and Symitar's core platforms.
Between Symitar's Episys and CruiseNet platforms, more than 800 credit unions clients now have the option to license CetoLogic's solution, according to CetoLogic Vice President David Austin.
And while Members 1st FCU is considered a large credit union, to date 12 other credit unions of varying asset classes have signed on. "Symitar's credit unions are now able to spend less time managing their cash management process and focus more on member needs," said Austin.
Saving Time on Cash Management
Before the new interface, Members 1st FCU was required to create in-house programs designed to convert the reporting data on the financial core into a format that CetoLogic would be able to field, according to Zimmerman.
"With today's implementation the work that was needed in the past is mostly completed on Ceto's systems," she said. "The process we use is fully automated from the creation of the reports, preparation of the data and delivery to Ceto."
The initial process to get the data from Symitar to CetoLogic required uploading Symitar files into a module that consolidated the numbers to create a report/spreadsheet. Next employees would upload into CetoLogic manually.
With the updated automated process, the files are automatically sent daily to CetoLogic and the information is uploaded to the system.
Additionally, Zimmer explained that over the last two years, the credit union has integrated CetoLogic with its armored carriers. This process required manually keying daily/weekly orders into the cash carrier's website. Together, Members 1st FCU and CetoLogic created a program that transmits the order to the armored carrier once it is approved in the system.
"Before implementation, the cash-order consolidation process alone would take three to four hours," said Zimmerman. "Now the process can be completed in less than an hour."
While Zimmerman said that overall the solution is working well, there are minor issues to deal with.
"The one thing I would say about this cash calculator is that it can be a bit finicky at times," she noted. "If one number is off, it could affect the recommendation, but depending or when that error happens, it might not necessarily be noticed right away."
Now that all branches are updated, management trusts CetoLogic's recommendation of how much cash to order and simply clicks and submits.
"The software consolidates all the branch orders and we are able to pull them all into one nice report," said Zimmerman. "This function alone has had a huge impact on the time and effort it takes to complete this task."
