Financial institutions have a real challenge in either selecting a new Core Software package or negotiating an updated contract in today’s world. There are SO many options with different vendors on the Core side, not to mention the plethora of ancillary products. To add to this challenge, many of the vendors have a large menu of Core products and sometimes are just taking a shot in the dark to put the right product with the right bank, credit union or savings bank.
The Garland Group provides consulting services to assist institutions with these choices, but frankly it’s even hard for those of us that stay close to the market place and informed on what products are available. It’s been our experience with vendor responses to Request for Proposals(RFP), that they are choosing from their menu of products based solely on the asset size, what the institution has installed now and not on the real requirements. Some of the problem is ours. We have been burying the specific needs of the institution in our standard requirements for a financial institution. All new RFPs will have these requirements highlighted to the vendors. We will also include a disclaimer that brings to the vendors attention special requirements.
More to come later on in-house vs. outsourced, what are the things that are REALLY different in Core systems, and where the savings are normally found.