Analytics is helping banks and corporations gain a competitive advantage by delivering actionable insights as well as an effective solution for addressing issues like safety and compliance. The corporate world can use the same technologies and strategies to address the challenge of bank account management (BAM).
The banking sector spent a total of $20.8 billion in big data analytics in 2016. Data and analytics have been transforming the way financial institutions handle risk management, safety, productivity, and deliver value to their customers. Analytics is the key to improving costs control and improving revenues for corporations.
Why is corporate bank account management a challenge?
Banking assets tend to become decentralized over time, and too many companies do not have a well-defined framework for managing risks, preventing fraud, and controlling fees and workflows.
The lack of visibility over a company’s bank accounts can be costly and make it difficult for C-suite level executives to manage this process effectively. The challenges of BAM for corporations are similar to the challenges faced by banks. These challenges include:
- Taking an inventory of existing accounts with accurate ownership and authorization information
- Keeping this information up to date
- Controlling data and who is authorized to access it
- Synchronizing data with bank records
- Meeting compliance requirements for collecting and handling data
BAM is not limited to bank accounts. Ideally, corporations should have a BAM process that encompasses other areas such as a framework to select the right bank partners, tracking banking fees, and managing transactions.
Addressing the corporate BAM challenge.
Financial institutions have to follow the KYC and FBAR requirements to track account ownership accurately. Your company can adopt these same standards to improve BAM:
- Banks use KYC standards to record and update information about a bank account holder’s identity and address.
- The IRS enforces the FBAR standards to ensure accurate reporting of foreign accounts.
Adopting these standards and customizing them to your corporate needs will give your company better visibility over existing banking assets, how they are used, and who uses them. The FBAR standards can help improve communication with foreign branches of a corporation.
Your company can benefit from going beyond the KYC and FBAR standards and developing a framework adapted to its structure. Managing banking assets will be easier if there is a centralized process to select banking partners, open new accounts, and manage changes.
You should consider building a data pipeline so that banking records can be integrated with your ERP solution. This framework should also address risk management, fraud detection, and regulatory issues.
Improving corporate BAM with technology.
Big data and the technology used to derive value from datasets have transformed the way banks address BAM. Financial officers and other C-suite executives can adopt these same technologies for internal BAM.
Machine learning and AI are helping banks spot trends, identify issues, build automated processes, and offer a better experience to their customer base. These are technologies you could adopt to streamline your BAM process, simplify the way employees report changes, and spot trends and problems.
Financial institutions have access to new market platforms to collect data and analyze it. To improve internal BAM, you might need to look into adopting a new data management tool or strategy, integrating data linked to bank accounts with your existing ERP solution, or rolling out a new platform. Developing a better strategy to manage corporate bank accounts should be a priority. Unmanaged finances can result in high costs, increase risks of fraud, and non-compliance violations. The strategies and tools used by banks are a solid foundation you can use to build a BAM framework customized to the needs of your company.