The Three Top Reasons For Vendor Consolidation
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Why should banks and credit unions consider consolidating their vendor relationships? Here are three top reasons why:
1. Save Time And Money
Banks and credit unions that reduce the number of their vendor partnerships can increase their operational efficiency and productivity. When an institution partners with multiple vendors, typically that means staff has to deal with multiple back-end systems, often accessing each system numerous times a day and struggling to keep abreast of all of the updates for every system. Sometimes, staff is even unnecessarily bogged down with having to deal with duplicative systems from multiple vendors.
Consolidating vendor relationships also can significantly reduce the amount of training for staff as well as for customers. Bank and credit union staff typically has to train customers on how to use vendors’ private-labeled portals, and that can be time-consuming, particularly if a financial institution uses multiple vendors with multiple portals. But if an institution uses the same vendor for multiple solutions that all have the same look and feel and the same technology, then training of both staff and customers is significantly reduced.
When banks and credit unions are able to negotiate fewer contracts, they can conduct less due diligence on potential vendors, as well as get more for their money by reducing the amount of monitoring and reporting required for risk and assessment compliance. On the other hand, having multiple contracts with multiple vendors adds even more burden to staff because they will also have to monitor different contract term dates for renewal, and then they’ll have to determine how one expiring contract could impact solutions from other vendors.
Furthermore, when a bank or credit union uses fewer vendors, the institution has more negotiating power because it frees up more dollars with the remaining vendors. The higher the volume provided to a vendor, the more likely they will offer their best pricing resulting in lower cost.
2. Save On Vendor Due Diligence
Financial institutions are increasingly responsible for keeping up with the third-party vendor management requirements of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the National Credit Union Administration, the Federal Reserve, and for state-chartered institutions, the requirements of state regulators.
For example, the FDIC’s Guidance for Managing Third-Party Risk (FIL-44-2008), provides four main elements of an effective third-party risk management process: risk assessment, due diligence in selecting a third party, contract structuring and review and oversight. But today, there’s even more heightened scrutiny, as a number of high-profile security breaches of major vendors has caused regulators to make sure that financial institutions are actually taking all the necessary steps spelled out in the regulations, such as the IT handbook of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC).
Banks and credit unions can find it very time consuming to conduct the proper due diligence and ongoing monitoring on each vendor. By partnering with a one vendor, financial institutions can significantly reduce their compliance burden.
3. Help Customers
Consolidating vendors can enable banks to greatly elevate the experience for their customers, by providing a single platform that is easy to navigate. Banks may also have access to additional monitoring and reporting of customer activity to help prevent and detect fraud.
Vendor consolidation can provide substantial return on investment by saving time and achieving cost savings, as well as reduce regulatory burdens by providing the right monitoring and reporting to meet compliance requirements. Partnering with a one vendor can not only save time and money and boost return on investment, but also enhance customer loyalty by elevating the user experiences on the platform.