Photo by James Sanna | Commercial Record staff
Berkshire Bank has partnered with New York-based financial technology company Narmi to implement a new digital process for opening deposit accounts.
The Boston-based bank, which has branches in eastern Connecticut and the Greater Hartford area, said in a statement that it has used Narmi’s platform for the past four months to provide a secure and quicker account opening process that also integrates with Alloy, an operating system that manages fraud, compliance and risk decisioning related to opening the account.
The platform provides automatic decisions for all digital account openings with qualified applicants approved using a fraud detection system. The bank said the new process reduces the time for consumers to open an account and is more cost effective for the bank.
“Narmi has been instrumental in helping us move toward our goal of being a leader in 21st-century community banking,” Sean Gray, president and acting CEO of Berkshire Bank, said in a statement. “Narmi’s digital-first and innovative account opening experience will drive organic growth in new accounts while delivering a best-in-class customer and staff user experience.”
The deposit account opening process works for mobile, desktop and tablet devices. It is connected to Berkshire’s core technology, FIS IBS, allowing the bank to keep its existing core banking processes.
During the four months it has been using the Narmi platform, the bank said the average time to complete application has been reduced to 2 minutes and 13 seconds, a 57 percent decrease in application time.
“We’re proud to align with Berkshire Bank to develop and launch an enterprise-grade account opening solution that will accelerate customer and deposit growth in an organic and responsible fashion,” Nikhil Lakhanpal, co-founder of Narmi, said in a statement. “Most importantly, our extensive experience with core banking systems and user-centric design allows Berkshire to offer an exceptional, seamless account opening experience to its customers.”
Berkshire also worked with Narmi to offer an independent account opening experience for Reevx Labs, the bank’s investment in the local communities it serves as a way to give opportunities to the underbanked. This separate experience specifically caters to the needs of emerging entrepreneurs, artists and nonprofit organizations.
