Headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii, American Savings Bank had been challenged by manual processes and lack of automation in its previous technology. Since its technology transformation with Fiserv, the bank has seen immediate business benefits, including reducing operating costs by half, improving the end customer experience in branch, call center and consumer online channels, and achieving a dramatic savings of 50 percent in cash management operations.

"In a short amount of time since implementing with Fiserv, we have been able to raise the level of automation and achieve efficiency with our branch automation, our back office branch and deposit operation support centers and our customer call centers within the bank, while reducing expenses," said Rick Robel, executive vice president, Operations and Technology, American Savings Bank.

American Savings Bank selected Fiserv to focus on growth and service by leveraging best-in-class systems on a common infrastructure to build improved, automated internal processes. With the Fiserv implementation, the bank has reduced the time required for common processes, such as opening new accounts, making address changes or selecting PINs. The time employees spent completing manual processes with previous technology systems is now spent engaging with customers. This increases cross sale and revenue opportunities, allowing employees to deepen the bank's relationship with customers based on a real-time, single view of the customer.

"Aperio(TM) was a key differentiator in our selection of Fiserv," said Robel. "The solution has enabled us to complete unique process improvements between the front and back office. For many common processes, we have reduced the frequency of re-entering customer information, and the information is available across most channels and departments with plans for continued integration and process improvement. Our customer-facing employees find Aperio easy to use and now have more time time to focus on the customer's needs."

With Aperio from Fiserv, the new account opening process, has been reduced from approximately fifteen minutes to between five to ten minutes; this includes instances where a customer opens a checking account, a check card and customer selected PIN, elects to enroll in online banking and bill pay with an electronic agreement and signature capture. This streamlining leaves the bank representative more time to develop the customer relationship. In addition, the bank has nearly eliminated paper from the new account opening process, saving costs on printing and mailing, and enabling a more "green" workplace.

Customer service representatives using Aperio in the bank's call center are more effective too. Implementation has reduced the training time necessary for call center employees to be ready to service customers. A higher volume of calls can be resolved while the customer is on the line with no further investigative time required.

The 600,000 customers of American Savings Bank are also benefiting from the new technology through major online banking enhancements. Corillian Online from Fiserv integrates online banking, bill payment and personal financial management tools into a single intuitive user interface. This combination of relevant, actionable information makes management of day-to-day financial tasks easier for customers.

To optimize cash supply chain management, American Savings Bank used iCom(R) from Fiserv to reduce physical cash levels in their network by 15 percent, translating into a $13.6 million dollar reduction in cash reserves. "Cash on hand" reserves were reduced by 40 percent from five days to three days, resulting in a cash reserve reduction of $21 million over seven months. Armored car service costs were reduced by 29 percent, saving thousands of dollars each year, and overall cash levels have been reduced by 50 percent within the last 18 months.

"Overall, we are very pleased with our Fiserv partnership and our working relationship. The support and teamwork to get us to where we are today in such a short time is proof of the dedication and partnership of Fiserv and the strength of their team," said Robel. "We now begin a new chapter in our journey as strategic partners in leveraging the Fiserv solutions and tools together. American Savings Bank and Fiserv will further automate and integrate our data and services to achieve further efficiencies and revenue growth. The power of what we were able to achieve with the initial implementation of a single customer view, which brings together a customer's deposits, loans, mortgages, credit card and rewards programs and other services is sign of things to come. There is tremendous potential."

"The success of our clients is our utmost goal," said Tony Catalfano, division president, Bank Solutions, Fiserv. "Fiserv is delivering on its promise to American Savings Bank, enabling it to reduce costs by streamlining internal operations, while at the same time improving the banking experience and relationship for its customers. American Savings Bank is the latest example of the Fiserv reputation for delivering scalable, flexible solutions to mid-to-large sized banks."

Working together with the bank's team, Fiserv pursued an aggressive implementation timeline to completely replace American Savings Bank's existing systems with more than 28 integrated products. Through their solid partnership, Fiserv and American Savings Bank were able to complete the conversion in less than 14 months.

This strategic implementation included innovative solutions from Fiserv for account processing and servicing, electronic document management, risk and performance, branch capture optimization, cash management, online banking and bill pay, eStatements, credit processing, debit processing and loan servicing.

"Celent sees a trend for banks seeking an integrated solution provider for core processing and ancillary solutions, such as the Fiserv and American Savings Bank implementation. By reducing dependency on multiple vendors, banks can have faster, less expensive and less risky implementations, and more seamlessly manage their operations with a set of solutions that integrates various functionalities," said Bart Narter, Senior Vice President Celent. "Banks want to be able to focus their efforts on banking. Therefore, they prefer solution providers that offer multi-channel technologies integrated to core banking solutions that provide flexible customization capabilities."

Fiserv is able to provide a cohesive suite of products, centered upon the powerful, service oriented architecture (SOA)-enabled Signature bank platform, to help financial institutions meet their strategic objectives. The multi-product solution implementation for American Savings Bank represented all five Fiserv core competencies: Processing Services, Customer and Channel Management, Business Insights and Optimization, Risk and Compliance, and Payments.