We sat down with representatives from 4Front Credit Union and Amarillo National Bank to discuss how Q2’s integrated back-office solutions have helped empower their employees, service their account holders, and continue growing during the pandemic.

Challenges faced since the pandemic

Over the last 18 months, financial institutions (FIs) have been forced to shutter their lobbies and quickly accelerate their digital-first operations. No matter where they were on their digitalization journey, most FIs have faced challenges, especially when it comes to implementing new back-office technologies and empowering staff to use them.

In the case of Amarillo National Bank, it needed to get its staff further up to speed on its digital capabilities and to accelerate digital services for customers. According to Jay Polvadore, AVP Digital Banking Manager, their FI needed to increase its use of Q2 tools available to digitally support their staff or customers.

For 4Front Credit Union, it became imperative that members were able to complete basic banking tasks online, like checking account balances or opening new lines of credit. According to Dani Burch, eServices Manager, since many members were transitioning online for the first time, this required a huge initial push for online seminars and tutorials on how to use 4Front’s products and services.

Bringing more options to the back office

Q2’s back-office tools have allowed Amarillo National Bank to transition more fully to the digital environment. And while there has been a learning curve, it’s been a much more straightforward and simple process than initially thought by the bank.

Most recently, the bank has been engaged with the activity tracking and reporting side of Console’s functionality to help stop credential stuffing. During one recent event, they were notified in real time of the suspicious attempt, immediately logged in to Console, and saw all potentially malicious logins via a user-friendly and actionable dashboard, stopping the attack and mitigating security risks to both the FI and their account holders.

4Front Credit Union has been more focused on the User management and administrative functions of Console. Being relatively new to it, they needed to divvy things up for their front-line employees, using an internal ticketing system to send requests to each other. To maintain a high level of service, Burch said, “We prioritize – we commit to having [tickets] done by the end of the day, and generally we can have them done in a couple of hours with Console’s easy-to-use, integrated interface.”

Empowering the front line to help account holders more easily

Both Polvadore and Burch reiterated the importance of equipping employees with the proper tools and training to help their account holders with whatever digital banking issue they were facing. Even if there had been some initial resistance to putting in new procedures or expanding front-line responsibilities, they’ve seen a positive impact across their organizations.

When employees were surveyed at Amarillo National Bank, the overwhelming response to the new back-office tools was highly positive. According to Polvadore, “When an employee comes in with a question, I can easily pop over to User management without disrupting anything I’m working on. That’s been a big deal for us. It has made everything seem a lot more productive and made everything run a lot smoother.”

When 4Front needed a way to better resolve login issues, they turned to another Q2 back-office tool, Q2 Co-Pilot. Burch raved, “It’s probably been the easiest transition of a program that we have ever gone through. CoPilot is incredibly user friendly and a great aid in servicing our members, from changing or resetting the password to unlocking locked logins. Co-Pilot also required no training for our front-end users, and when time is of the essence, that’s a very nice thing.”

Advice for other FIs from two tested sources

While it can be hard to know where to focus your back-office efforts with so much at stake, there were several key, overlapping suggestions from both FIs.

Train, train, train. Use customer and employee feedback to design new online tutorials and training programs. Even though branches have reopened, newly digital account holders will expect to be educated and informed via digital channels and new tools.

Respond to customer needs and security events right away. It’s imperative that when issues do arise, employees feel confident and empowered to respond immediately to proactively assist account holders. This is easier with Q2’s web-based, User management and reporting that can be accessed anytime, anywhere.

Collaborate with Q2’s product team and account managers. Work closely to help in the development of upcoming features and functionalities based on your employee and customer feedback, and business objectives. If your FI is interested in participating in research on upcoming back-office functionality, please email research@q2.com.

Watch the full webinar, “Driving Efficiency and Digital Strategy with Modern Back-Office Tools and Real-Time Data Insights“ and discover more about how Q2’s solutions can help your back office stay organized and efficient for any challenges to come.