Survey reveals most frequently experienced pain points with treasury management onboarding

Las Vegas--WAUSAU Financial Systems, the industry leader in receivables processing solutions, and Treasury Strategies, Inc., the leading treasury consulting firm, today released a study revealing that corporations experience multiple pain points at least 50 percent of the time through the treasury management implementation process. Among key pain points include “on-time implementation,” lack of visibility into implementation status and poor communication with the bank.

The survey, completed by 19 banks with assets of $25 billion plus and 20 corporations with revenue $500 million and greater, identifies the negative impact a paper-intensive onboarding process has on revenue and client satisfaction and ways banks can streamline the process. The results also identify gaps in technology, revealing many large banks aren’t effectively using the technology they already have in place, and mid-sized banks could benefit from some enhancements.

Advances in technology to improve the treasury management process can also be a revenue driver, because 70 percent of banks surveyed believe improving the implementation process will free up their sales team, while 90 percent believe a significant opportunity exists to accelerate revenue by shortening the implementation cycle time.

“Treasury onboarding today is bogged down by a paper-intensive process,” said Vicky Unson, principal, Treasury Strategies, Inc. “Banks are focused on finding better, more efficient ways of onboarding treasury management services for customers. Optimizing the onboarding process is a major initiative for many banks with whom we work, given its strong impact on winning new and subsequent business. At the same time, corporate customers welcome innovations such as paperless treasury solutions to provide them with a smoother onboarding process.”

On a scale from one to five, with five being a “very strong impact,” corporations rated the treasury management implementation process a four-plus, validating the significance of the initial sale as well as the influence on future purchase behavior. In addition, more than 75 percent of corporations believe electronic documents would be an acceptable alternative to paper-based documents.

Automated solutions exist to eliminate paper from the implementation process and can complete in hours the tasks for which today’s paper-reliant processes require multiple days. Such solutions include workflow technology and electronic signatures generated via mobile tablet devices like iPads. The study shows that half of the corporate respondents believe the use of an iPad would improve their satisfaction with the implementation process.

Banks are overwhelmingly receptive to the use of an iPad to gather data and signatures directly from the customer during the implementation process. However, none of the banks surveyed claim to be using this tool today. Astonishingly, the biggest obstacle across all banks surveyed related to the use of electronic signatures as none of those surveyed claimed to support this technology.

During the WAUSAU onboarding discovery process, where a financial institution sets out to identify potential efficiency gains and process improvement opportunities, one bank improved its treasury fulfillment process by 35 percent by adopting paperless solutions. In addition, these solutions are even helping banks manage compliance requirements for safeguarding sensitive information.

“A paperless solution solves the key challenges with treasury fulfillment,” said Joe Pitzo, vice president, Paperless Enterprise Solutions, WAUSAU Financial Systems. “This survey validates the need for paperless solutions – for both banks and corporations – pointing to real business value including accelerated revenue and strengthened customer relationships.”

WAUSAU’s Paperless Treasury solution combines electronic document origination, document imaging and automated workflow technology to help banks reduce costs, increase customer satisfaction and free sales teams to spend more time improving the customer experience.