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Editorial Viewpoint From a Customer's Perspective |
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Spotlight On Bank of the West |
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Case Study Atmos Energy Heats Up... |
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COVER STORY Commerce Intelligence Solution Identifies High-Potential... |
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NEWS REPORT 2006 Initiatives Enhance Content, Speed, Ease of Use... |
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NEWS REPORT Research Offers Insights on Consumer Adoption and Use of Online... |
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NEWS REPORT Account Support Team Refocuses and Expands Customer Service Commitment |
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NEWS REPORT Debt Know How Program Provides Valuable Resources for Consumer Debt... |
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NEWS REPORT Ignite Adoption and Usage with Electronic Version of Consumer Online Bill Payment... | |
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INDUSTRY INSIGHTS Q&A with Dan Schatt |
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SPOTLIGHT ON 
Bank of the West |
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Founded in 1874 and headquartered in San Francisco, Bank of the West today serves over 4 million households and businesses in hundreds of communities in 19 Western and Midwestern states. The third-largest commercial bank headquartered west of the Mississippi River, this high-performance, full-service regional financial services company with $55 billion in assets looks to MasterCard RPPS to deliver the most efficient and cost-effective processing for its online bill payment service. Finding the right online payment solution A MasterCard RPPS customer since 2002, Bank of the West came to the network via a third-party provider that offered the bank a least-cost routing solution that leverages multiple payment processors. "Looking at all the vendors and solutions that were available, MasterCard RPPS had the most extensive listing of billers that we could pay electronically. That and the network's cost-effectiveness were the two factors that drove our decision to use MasterCard RPPS as the primary processor," says Laurie Callagy, vice president and senior product manager for Online Banking, Bank of the West. As a MasterCard RPPS customer, Bank of the West has enjoyed a significant increase in its volume of electronic payments. In January 2006, the bank registered a nearly 85% increase in transaction volume over the previous January. Attracting customers to online bill pay To raise customer awareness about its online bill payment service and stimulate adoption, Bank of the West participated in the MasterCard RPPS Consumer Online Bill Payment Marketing Program pilot in 2004—with excellent results. The program offered a $25 incentive to customers who pay three bills a month online for at least three months. Bank of the West targeted 10,000 customers divided into three categories: online customers who had never paid online, inactive bill payers, and offline customers with no online history. The overall response rate for fulfillment was 3.4%, with the three groups posting 4.9%, 3.5%, and 1.8%, respectively. "The number of online bill payers that we attracted with the MasterCard RPPS marketing program—as well as the percentage that continued to pay online six months after the promotion's conclusion—was gratifying to us," she says. "We hope to revisit this successful program in the future." Smooth transitions Bank of the West has been growing aggressively since the mid-1990s, and three significant recent acquisitions—Community First Bank, Union Safe Deposit Bank, and Commercial Federal Bank, the nation's 12th-largest thrift—expanded its footprint significantly. The extensive reach of the MasterCard RPPS network has allowed the bank to easily extend its online bill payment service to its acquired customer base. "When the new customers convert to our online bill payment service, they get excellent biller penetration with MasterCard RPPS," says Callagy. With the Commercial Federal Bank acquisition, Bank of the West systematically converted Commercial Federal online bill-pay customers into its own service, rather than simply issuing an invitation. "As we know, online banking is a sticky product," Callagy says. "The conversion enabled us to make the transition as smooth as possible for these customers, increasing the likelihood that they would remain with Bank of the West." Raising electronic volume Looking ahead, Callagy says she'll focus on expanding the percentage of payments that can be sent electronically, a topic she discussed with MasterCard RPPS Sales representatives recently. "We shared our check lists with MasterCard RPPS, and they're reviewing our biller lists for aliases, upcoming billers, and biller changes," she says. "Together, we're working with existing and prospective billers to boost that percentage." Citing MasterCard RPPS reach, cost-effectiveness, expertise in biller information management, and marketing support, Callagy summarizes the bank's relationship with the network by saying, "MasterCard RPPS is the right choice for us." 
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