BANKBOSTON OPTIMIZES DISTRIBUTION NETWORK WITH CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM
BankBoston and Tessera Enterprise Systems recently completed the development of a decision support system that is enabling the Bank to understand its customers' channel usage, supporting the Bank's ongoing efforts to optimize its distribution network.
By studying how, when and where customers make their transactions, the Bank is now better equipped to make sound distribution decisions -- such as where best to locate branches and ATMs. The result is a win-win situation: customers benefit as their preferences and behaviors drive BankBoston's distribution management strategies, and the Bank benefits by making its network more efficient. In addition, customer satisfaction and retention are expected to increase as a result of enhanced channel deployment and utilization.
The BankBoston/Tessera team was among the first in the country to integrate the new technology needed to support the Bank's analyses. The system is built on an IBM S70 parallel server running IBM's UDB/EE, and utilizes the latest EMC disk array storage devices. These components were selected to meet user performance requirements and data volumes, which are expected to exceed 500 GB. The database contains detailed transaction information and data from over 30 sources, and is growing at a rate of about 14 GB per month.
Despite the significant technical challenges and high-profile mission, the project team completed design and development in less than six months, after a brief requirements phase. Led by BankBoston Distribution Planning Director, Jonathan Voorhees, and Corporate Data Management Director, Avram Gusman, this effort succeeded because a strong business and technical partnership was formed -- one that was committed to achieving critical business objectives. This partnership enabled all major functionality/design decisions to be judged from the dual perspectives of real business need and technical feasibility. Moreover, because deadlines were taken very seriously, both business and IT managers focused on controlling scope. In fact, close coordination and continuous, careful planning streamlined project execution from start to finish.
While typical bank Data Center installations can easily take weeks, BankBoston Data Center personnel and Tessera's technical staff completed migration of the system from Tessera's development site to the Bank's production facility within a day. BankBoston IT staffs have taken over the ongoing maintenance and updating of the database and according to Jonathan Voorhees, "The project was a success because Tessera, BankBoston's IT group and the business users were able to work well together and make decisions together quickly."
Though this technology is impressive in its own right, the real gain is in how it enables business users to succeed. To that end, Bank analysts and managers use Cognos Powerplay/Impromptu and a customized version of MapInfo Corporation's MapInfo Professional to gather the objective information needed to support complex business decision-making. With this software, BankBoston can now answer questions in a fraction of the time it used to take, if they could be answered at all, allowing the Bank to adapt to changing customer behaviors in a more timely and appropriate fashion.
According to Jonathan Voorhees, "This system takes information out of the hands of the data guardians and places it in the hands of ultimate end users of the information. We all gain a far better and deeper understanding of how our customers actually use the variety of channel options the Bank provides."
The system has been in production for about four months and is already paying for itself. It has resulted in better use of actual customer information, which has translated into reduced attrition risks, greater targeting capabilities, and improved ongoing cost management of the existing distribution network.
BankBoston now utilizes this business-critical system in its every day efforts to enhance customer interactions. By every measure, the effort is a huge success.
BankBoston is the 15th largest U.S. commercial bank, serving two million customers throughout Southern New England. Formed by the 1996 merger of Bank of Boston and BayBank, BankBoston operates 440 branches and 700 remote ATM locations.
As recently announced, BankBoston is in the midst of a merger with Fleet Financial Group forming the 8th largest commercial bank in the country with over 5700 locations serving nearly 20 million customers.
Tessera Enterprise Systems is a pioneer in the field of customer relationship management (CRM) solutions. Tessera's solutions incorporate marketing strategies, quantitative services, and data warehousing technologies that enable its clients to make better decisions and better manage their relationships with their own customers.
Tessera's Fortune 1000 clients represent financial services, insurance, direct marketing, health care, utilities, communications, and retail industries.