Benefits of automation

An intelligent case management application enables banks to improve the efficiency of their payment exception and investigation processing, while simultaneously reducing costs. By automating many tasks, skilled investigators can be freed up to focus on more complex investigations, and with both the quantity and quality of available data enhanced, it is easier for them to identify patterns and anomalies.

Case management applications also enable banks to centralise query and investigation processing across the entire organisation (including subsidiaries and partner banks) to a ‘single point of truth’. The increasingly complex application architectures within banks, with most utilising a range of SaaS and ‘on-premise’ services, have increased the need for this approach.

Integrating all stakeholders in the bank – branches, fraud, AML, sanctions, booking and settlement, and client management – tightly into the investigation process and having all queries processed in a single place using a common interface helps to improve accuracy as well as efficiency, reducing errors.

With the appropriate technology in place, banks can expect to reduce investigation time and processing costs by as much as 30-50%.

Choosing an application

The applications that will provide the best productivity gains for financial institutions will have been designed to process queries and investigations with a dedicated focus on financial transactions and market schemes.

When choosing an application, banks should look for:

• Full support of Swift MT, ISO20022 CBPR+, RTGS and SEPA standards
• Easy integration into their back office via standard customizable interfaces
• Full case management capabilities, including audit trail, statistics, and reporting
• Rule-based processing for best parametrization of standard investigation handling
• Seamless integration with external sources of information like Swift GPI

In a highly commoditised market such as payments, finding the right technology partners is key to reducing costs, increasing efficiencies, and maintaining an excellent reputation. By leveraging back-office operational applications, such as exception management platforms, financial institutions can increase efficiencies and reduce risk in the back office all the way through to the customer service process.