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The Bottom Line

SRM Perspectives on Key Industry Trends

How Vendor Contract Management Can Help You This Budget Season

Posted by Ben Mrva on Aug 30, 2017 12:30:00 PM

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For anyone working at a company with a calendar-based fiscal year, the August dog days of summer also mean the advent of the annual planning cycle. Odds are that department heads are being asked to “do more with less,” or at least to increase output at a faster rate than costs. As anyone with budget responsibility is well aware, it’s no easy task to fund reasonable pay increases for valued employees let alone accommodate growth in other expense areas.

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Topics: Vendors & Contracts

Core Conversions: Are Financial Institutions in Denial or Pursuing New Approaches

Posted by Bret Herbert on Aug 18, 2017 12:00:00 PM

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Much has been written about the “stickiness” of consumer payment apps and their value in cementing bank and credit union relationships with customers and members, but behind the scenes at most financial institutions (FIs) there is a far stickier relationship.  In this relationship, the bank or credit union is the customer and the cement composed of those mission critical services provided by their core processing vendor.

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Topics: Strategic Sourcing, Vendors & Contracts

How Tech Trends Lead to Longer Vendor Contract Rosters

Posted by Michael Carter on Aug 9, 2017 11:00:00 AM

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Most bankers would agree that, all other things being equal, minimizing the cost of complexity is a key operational goal, which normally means consolidating around a limited number of financial services vendors. The big “gotcha” in the above statement, however, is that all other things are rarely equal, and recent industry trends reveal that other factors are at work.

In a perfect world, core banking service providers would serve as one-stop shops for ancillary products like mobile banking and remote deposit capture as well. In fact, an acquisition spree by the cores over recent years was aimed to round out their portfolios and solidify that single-source status. Recently, however, newer startups have delivered compelling enough innovations to prompt financial institutions (FIs) to expand their horizons. 

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Topics: Vendors & Contracts

Regulations Are a Fact Of Life: Don’t Let Vendor Contract Management Create More Expenses

Posted by Patrick Goodwin, President on Aug 2, 2017 11:30:00 AM

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The spiraling cost of complying with an ever increasing regulatory burden is possibly the greatest challenge facing US banks and credit unions – it’s not an exaggeration to label it an existential threat for some institutions. However, this threat can be mitigated by utilizing expertise available from compliance and strategic sourcing firms as well as via software automation. It won’t make the regulations go away, but it makes the process more efficient and helps make it less likely that something is overlooked.

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Topics: Strategic Sourcing, Vendors & Contracts

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