KeyCorp Sees Big Return On Content Management Investment 2

While many companies bemoan their lack of return on their IT investments, KeyCorp, a financial institution with $84 billion in assets, is laughing about its ROI, all the way to the, er, bank.

KeyCorp says it's pocketing a cool $12 million a year in operational savings and improved customer service from a new imaging system centered around Mobius Management Systems Inc.'s ViewDirect content-management software. The system, which took two years to develop, gives 13,000 internal users access to monthly content, including 80 million checks, 36 million statements, and 175 million report pages. Retail and commercial customers have secure Web-based access to check images, statements, and other account information.

The savings result from reduced mailings of customer statements, tape storage consolidations, and elimination of microfiche. More than 90,000 customers have elected to turn off paper statements and receive them online. KeyCorp has saved $92,000 a month from doing away with microfiche alone.

The system provides a single electronic archive for regulatory compliance, internal operations, and customer service. It replaces a microfiche-based system with an image-based one in which documents are scanned, indexed and stored for 30 to 90 days on disk storage media, then transferred to virtual tape storage access. To accommodate the increase in storage requirements, KeyCorp has doubled its direct attached storage device pool in its primary data centers, says Allyn Pytel, senior VP of media and output management. It also has installed image-capture cameras on its IBM check sorters.

The system stands to save the bank an additional $10 million a year in transportation costs by allowing it to send images of checks to other banks in lieu of paper; that's been made possible by the Check Clearing for the 21st Century Act, also known as Check 21, which takes effect in October.