Money in the bank - Barclays Bank working to ensure 100 percent ATM availability with Command/Post software - Product Information - Brief Article

Software Magazine, Dec, 1997 by Deborah Cimino

With C/P, Barclays cashes in on 100% ATM availability

As banks automate more of their services, customers have come to depend on quick and easy access to their cash. So when you local ATM is out of money and you have to hoofit several blocks to another bank's machine, you're miffed at both the inconvenience and the extra surcharge that you've accrued. So what's your bank doing about it?

Barclays Bank knows all too well that unhappy-customers aren't good for business. One of the largest retail banks in the U.K., Barclays is trying to ensure that funds are always available to its patrons and, in the process, stay one step ahead of the competition. "Retaining existing customers is paramount to us," says Trevor White, manager of Command/Post implementation for Barclays Technology Services, the bank's IT arm. "It was identified through customer surveys that of all the factors that affect people changing banks, availability of cash points is one of them."

But how does a major bank ensure that its network of 3,300 ATM machines are functioning at 100% availability? According to White, Barclays first ran a pilot project in one of its 10 ATM regions, using Boole & Babbage's Command/Post to monitor the region's 200 ATMs over a three-month period. Pleased with the increase in ATM availability levels during that time, the bank now uses C/P to centrally manage its entire ATM network.

Prior to C/P, White estimates that Barclays' ATMs achieved 95% availability. While White maintains that CdP has helped improve that figure, he acknowledges that it can't prevent ATMs from breaking down, running out of cash, or even suffering network outages. It does, however, give the bank an edge. "[Command/Post] facilitates getting the right people involved as quickly as possible to resolve the particular outage," he says.

And that's welcome news to Barclays' help desk staff. Previously the bank used a PC package that provided minimal information on problems, says White. "It had restrictions on the number of alarms it could manage from the ATMs and it had a restriction on the number of ATMs it could have in its database," he says. With C/P, the alarms that come into the help desk are color-coded so that operators can focus on the most important ones first. "CaP's prioritization capability has played a big part in getting the more critical ATMs back online," says White, adding that previously help desk staffers had no idea if they were working on a busy ATM in London of a less-trafficked site out in the country. "A lot of our ATMs are in supermarkets and malls and they're high-through put and critical to get back online as quickly as possible," he notes.

Even with ATM availability levels on the rise, Barclays isn't resting on its laurels. The bank plans to use CaP's PhonePoint component to automatically escalate some of the more straightforward problems to people who can sort them out, says White. For example, if an ATM runs out of cash in a branch bank, rather than have a help desk operator make a call to the branch and tell someone to refill the machine, PhonePoint will automatically place the call. This capability would allow the help desk to focus on more complex problems, he adds.