Case Studies

Collateral Tracking System Improves Process Efficiency

Project at a Glance

RDA developed a collateral tracking system for Chevy Chase Bank that automates the process of identifying deposits that need to be collateralized, communicates the collateral requirements to the Treasury group, and receives the input of the collateral allocated by the Treasury group. This solution was able to interface with their other systems and gather data and information to eliminate errors and provide a quick and prompt method for our client to ensure service for its customers.

About Our Client

Chevy Chase Bank is the largest bank headquartered in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, with over 3000 employees, 280 branches, and 1,000 ATMs.

Background

Chevy Chase Bank (CCB) has four different departments that track collateral. The bank had no system in place to automate this process and alert them when additional collateral was required. Additionally, the bank pays interest on collateral. Depending on the collateral type, the interest calculation would differ. All the processing for interest calculation and reporting the interest to bank customers was being done manually by the bank. The users would receive a printout of account balances and they would then manually calculate the amount of collateral needed. Then they would communicate the collateral assigned, the duration it had been assigned for, etc. to the Treasury Management group, which would perform additional interest calculation and generate reports for their customers and for bank management.

CCB wanted to institute a standard, automated process for the collateral tracking system to improve speed, efficiency and accuracy.

Solution Detail

The Commercial Banking Automatic Collateral Tracking System automates the process of identifying deposits that need to be collateralized, communicates the collateral requirements to the Treasury group, receives the input of the collateral allocated by the Treasury group, and then calculates the daily interest and other account and collateral related information for the Treasury Management Services. In addition to this, the new system generates on-demand reports related to compliance or funds management. It also generates reports which could be pushed to certain users when triggered by the system. For example, if an account became under collateralized for any reason, the system automatically generates a report and mails it to the concerned user(s). This functionality is highly appreciated by all users and especially by management, since it eliminates errors and provides a quick and prompt method for the bank to ensure service for its customers.

RDA worked closely with CCB to define the business and technical requirements for the system. RDA then designed, developed, performed end-to-end testing and deployed the system. The system interfaced with the Bank's Hogan system for settlement information as well as the Treasury Group System and the Public Funds database.

The system is comprised of three major pieces: a business engine that interfaces with the external systems and performs collateral calculation; a set of user interface screens developed in .NET 2.0 for users to enter and process account-related information; and a SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services solution to generate the reports.

At an enterprise level, CCB decided to move forward with Microsoft business intelligence tools and to utilize SQL Server 2005 and Reporting Services 2005. The Automated Collateral Tracking System was the first solution built with these technologies that was deployed to the bank's production environment.

Benefits

One of the biggest factors that made this solution exceptional for Chevy Chase Bank was the ease with which Microsoft technologies could be used to build interfaces with disparate systems. Chevy Chase Bank has many silos of information, systems and teams that need to work together but did not have any easy way of sharing information. Using Microsoft technologies, this solution was able to interface with their other systems and gather data and information. This data was then added to a SQL Server database and now that database holds historic data retrieved from other systems which can be used by the teams in question.

A second highlight for our client is the ease with which the solution can be deployed and updated. RDA developed the solution, completed integration testing and completed user testing long before the bank was actually ready to move it to production. When they were ready with the environment, all that we needed to do was get the latest source from Source Safe and build and deploy it using a release notes document prepared earlier. Even when upgrades, modifications or changes were needed, the onsite development team was able to develop and apply those changes in a very limited period of time with hardly any down time for production users. This was a big help for Chevy Chase Bank, since the collateral information is very time sensitive and daily processing is essential. Being able to put in upgrades and modify software quickly without putting the end users in too much pain was a big selling point of the solution.

Technically Speaking

This solution incorporates the following technologies:

• ASP .NET 2.0
• SQL Server 2005
• Reporting Services 2005
• Microsoft Office 2003
• Visual Studio 2005

Client Testimonial

"The objective of this project was to design a common system solution for managing all forms of collateral for several business units that have somewhat different processes and reporting requirements. For one business unit the system had to automate the process of identifying deposits that need to be collateralized at varying levels and then communicating that information to a treasury group. The system would also support the business unit's ability to produce monthly and quarterly reports to comply with regulatory requirements. The second group also required identifying deposits to be collateralized, but in addition needed the system to perform extensive calculations to determine the appropriate interest rates and interest amounts to apply to accounts and then to generate "customer notices." The key benefit of this automated system would be identifying and eliminating the daily manual process of reviewing account balances to determine the appropriate collateral levels and the very labor intensive process of calculating interest rates and amounts and applying them to the appropriate accounts. The system met its objective and also provided the users with needed reports."

Rhonda Cunningham Holmes
Vice President
Government Financial Services
Chevy Chase Bank, F.S.B.