Our Financial Institutions team understands the ongoing and emerging challenges of the industry because we're immersed in it every day. We know a Financial Institutions competitiveness depends on the performance of their technology, but more importantly, their ability to consistently provide a distinguished level of service. We apply our in-depth industry knowledge to our work with Financial Institutions as a partner, helping them exceed expectations. The service we provide is inherently the level of service Financial Institutions provide to their clients. The key is to work with a partner that can help narrow the range of choices to something that makes sense for their business, and outline the pros and cons of each strategy. Our goal is to work with our Financial Institution clients to implement a solution that best aligns their needs with today's market realities.

The following case study demonstrates how Cambridge was able to address serious business issues that were facing a large Financial Institution. A large Financial Institution with many downstream financial institution clients was facing significant international payments issues, along with process inefficiencies that were raising red flags with auditors. Although local financial institutions had the ability to make domestic payments, making international payment often became an issue, especially when the main provider was a larger bank that Case Study: A Financial Institution Client Cambridge was able to address the issues facing this Financial Institution through the implementation of a private label version of Cambridge Online with a Single Sign-On (SSO) login.

The private label element allowed the financial institution to maintain the look and feel of their system on Cambridge's platform, while SSO allowed for a seamless and secure transition between the websites. By enabling both, the client was able to perform all their operations using one password. Furthermore, the SSO capability allowed for a safe and compliant integration that not only gave the client payments capabilities, but also control and reporting functionality all on one platform. By enabling different approval models, as well as the capability to create parent-child entities, Cambridge was able to ensure the delivery of excellent business practices with all required security elements. "With a web-based, user friendly platform, Cambridge offered BBN an opportunity to raise the bar. Drawing on the knowledge and experience of their dedicated staff, Cambridge helped us automate our internal processes, expand reporting capabilities and increase the functionality offered to our community banks and credit unions." Lisa Reynolds Senior VP, Risk and Technology BBN Partners is a competitor. In addition, due to a variety of platforms and solutions, the process was often quite cumbersome and created issues with the regulators and auditors. Furthermore, with an increasingly stringent regulatory banking environment, compliance and security issues had the potential to cause significant business risks

Required:

a)Explain the various services offered by financial institutions.(5 Marks)

b)Explain how the services may be improved to enable those services to more efficient.(5 Marks)