Headlines:
Webster Hires Fidelity - Again
Webster Bank of Waterbury, Conn., which signed with Fidelity Information Services Inc. for outsourced core processing last year, will switch to it for check processing too.
Zeynep Fredrick, the bank's executive vice president of information and technology, said it is unhappy with the cost and quality of service from its current check processor, which she would not identify.
Webster picked Fidelity as an alternative "because of the synergy between core processing and item processing," said Ms. Fredrick, who is also a senior vice president of the bank's $16.8 billion-asset parent, Webster Financial Corp.
The 10-year core processing deal, announced in September, includes deposit accounting, consumer and commercial loan origination and servicing, mortgage servicing, and branch automation services.
While the first deal was being negotiated, Fidelity was bolstering its item processing capabilities by buying the outsourcers Aurum Technology Inc. of Plano, Tex., and InterCept Inc. of Atlanta, Ms. Fredrick said. Now that is has bought them, Webster can shift its check processing, she said.
"We moved pretty quickly on the item processing because we already had a sizeable agreement," she said. The five-year pact was announced Thursday.
Fidelity Information Services, which is majority owned by Fidelity National Financial Inc. of Jacksonville, Fla., is to take over the check processing by midyear. Webster does its core processing in-house; Fidelity is to take that over by the end of the third quarter.
Mellon Lockbox Forms Online
Banks that provide wholesale lockbox services under their own brands through outsourcing arrangements with Mellon Financial Corp. will soon be able to setup accounts online.
The Philadelphia banking company said its Mellon Enterprise Cash Management will introduce online setup forms for disbursement services in the first half and put all setup forms online by yearend. The plan was announced last week, after a pilot test with several customers.
The unit runs a nationwide lockbox network with operations in seven cities.
"We want to make it easy for our bank customers to do business with us and, in turn, streamline our bank customers' processes," said executive vice president Robert W. Stasik, the head of Mellon Global Cash Management, in a press release.
