Banking on a bright future
Project Partners
Banking on a bright future Written by Nell Walker Produced by George Tweed
Paul Johnson Aldermore’s Chief Information Officer
Paul Johnson, CIO of Aldermore Bank, explains how the company has become one of Europe’s leading alternative banks, and how technology will continue to change the industry
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hile ordinarily it would be rare at best to praise a bank for its customer-focussed personal touch, Aldermore stands out as a trusted champion of the small-and-medium enterprise. The business began in 2009, led by CEO Phillip Monks, and supported by AnaCap Financial Partners. It provides its products and solutions to consumers as well as SMEs, including asset finance, invoice finance, commercial,
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residential mortgages and savings, predominately online and via its network of regional offices. This diverse selection is a breath of fresh air amongst a sea of incumbent banks, ensuring Aldermore’s status as a leading alternative. Business Review Europe met with Paul Johnson, Chief Information Officer of Aldermore Bank, at the company’s London offices to discuss its operations and how it maintains such a positive reputation.
“As CIO, my responsibilities revolve around ensuring the technology systems that we have are sustainable, reliable, ensuring all customer data is secure and used in the right way, that we’re regulatory compliant in those areas, deliver innovation, and provide the company with more product capabilities for the customer,” Johnson says of his role at Aldermore. He began in the Royal Navy as an electronics and computer engineer, which aided in developing
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his leadership skills, before undertaking various technology jobs, leading to more project and customer-focussed roles. “I joined GMAC, an auto finances company, as their CIO for Europe,” Johnson explains. “I moved to Lloyds Banking Group where I held two senior IT roles; however, after several years in large established organisations, I wanted a change – to build and develop something sustainable and exciting, which led to me moving to Aldermore Bank. I took the opportunity to help grow a new bank, which I couldn’t resist.” Customer service As a bank without any branches, most of Aldermore’s business
Gemma Donnelly Aldermore Mortgage Advisor
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is conducted online, through intermediators or directly to the customer. This makes technology fundamental to everything the company does, especially regarding the interface itself and the back-end security required. Intermediaries drive a lot of Aldermore’s mortgage products and asset finance products, making relationships with them significant. “What’s key is the relationship
between Aldermore and the broker, and the broker and the customer,” says Johnson. “Once the product is originated, the relationship shifts to one that’s between the customer and us. We need to have great information going into the marketplace to show the benefits of doing business with Aldermore, and what people can expect from us. “The fact that we don’t have any branches does mean that the channels to the customer are pretty broad – either via a basic SMS type of messenger, through electronic medium, internet channels, or mobile apps.” Aldermore’s ongoing focus on the customer and their needs means flexibility and a dynamic approach as customers’ needs change over time. “It wasn’t long ago that we spoke about digital marketing, which was pretty much an origination of a first point of contact interface,” Johnson explains. “Now, the customer wants their whole lifetime managed through the digital experience where they can self-manage and self-serve.” When asked what makes the company stand out, Johnson hands the issue over to the point of view of Aldermore’s customers, stating that “other people decide why we’re different and tell us in the reviews they leave us”. The key, he says, is transparency to the customer, ensuring that what they see is what they get, and that
2009
The year that Aldermore Bank was founded
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How Aldermore put security at the centre of their hosted services with ServerChoice. A long-term, trusted partner, ServerChoice provide Aldermore’s primary data centre hosting, with full replication of their environment at our secondary data centre. In addition, we manage the connectivity between each site and secure Aldermore’s internet connectivity through the use of our advanced Intrusion Prevention Systems and DDoS Mitigation service. As secure hosting specialists, ServerChoice added even more value and reassurance to Aldermore through our additional cyber security services. Aldermore now benefit from a complete monitoring solution for all their key internal and external infrastructure. This is delivered through ServerChoice’s custom-built SIEM software, which is monitored 24/7 from our very own Security Operations Centre in the UK.
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the rules won’t change later on. “We let them know everything well in advance, and they can decide if it’s appropriate for them,” he explains. “We are very customer-focussed. Lots of companies say that, but as a relatively new organisation, our development is really concentrated on that direct channel, our relationships, communication into the marketplace, and making sure that what we
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promote all those benefits. Aldermore has an entirely open ratings and review system where any customer can leave feedback. If a bad service is given, it will be on Aldermore’s website for all to see, and this feature drives a great deal of engagement: “Transparency equals trust. If we’re transparent, they can trust us – and vice versa.” Supplier relationships Alongside relationships with
customers, Aldermore’s relationships with suppliers are just as essential to its success. “We can plan strategically what we want for the future, and the closer suppliers can get to companies like Aldermore Bank, the more they understand the customer,” says Johnson. Aldermore chose a handful of key suppliers to build its capability through: “We haven’t got the legacy of lots of people working within the IT area of Aldermore, and therefore some of the skills that may have been relevant five, 10, or 15 years ago are less relevant now,” Johnson says. “Where we’ve got specific intellectual property, we use trusted partners to help us develop that capability. Those might be
“We need to have great information going into the marketplace to show the benefits of doing business with Aldermore, and what people can expect from us” – Paul Johnson, Chief Information Officer of Aldermore Bank
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short-term, because we want to build some of that intellectual property and capability in-house, but only at the right point in time. Most of our relationships are quite flexible, and very collaborative.” Business development While Aldermore’s revenues and profits enjoyed a sizeable leap last year, Johnson states that this
David Ray Aldermore Business Development Manager
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growth has been entirely organic based upon a continued focus on what the company does best. What has driven the company’s growth thus far is simply customers learning more about the company, which by its very nature increases levels of interest, spurring the company to ensure its products are fit for purpose. “Our really impressive increase
CASE STUDY
ELITE TELE.COM AND SWYX
Elite Tele.com and Swyx provide resilient cloud-based unified communications for Aldermore Bank Background In 2011 Aldermore decided to review its telephony system. A number of vendors including Cisco, Mitel, Avaya were considered, but after a detailed tender process, due to its flexibility and functionality-rich capabilities, Aldermore selected software based unified communications platform Swyx, recommended by UC specialist Elite Tele.com. A move to centralised communications The transition to the new system, began with Elite creating a tailored design and architecture proposal that would suit Aldermore’s need to provide both robust and centralised communications for its staff, intermediaries and customers. The project began with a pilot for 30 staff at one of its sites and has since been rolled out to over 900 employees including 60 contact centre staff. The system is hosted centrally across Aldermore’s own datacentres with built-in stand-by servers for business continuity. Elite is available 24/7 to help with any necessary support requests. Cost-savings, enhanced service and security As a result of installing Swyx, the Bank has been able to streamline its communications leading to reduced costs, more personalised services for customers and easier IT management. With built-in conferencing and call recording, Swyx provides additional functionality that saves significant monthly costs. Elite recommended combining Swyx with MCC (MyContactCentre) to support Aldermore’s contact centres with skills based routing, wallboards and detailed reporting. Elite has also introduced other innovations that enable Aldermore to create highly personalised communications for customers. One example involves capturing cookies on the website that can gather information on their browsing history. In turn, interested customers are able to click on a number which is given a unique ID and the call is then automatically directed to the right advisor. In real-time Aldermore can then provide advice based on what products or services the customer has just been viewing on the site.
Further information
www.elitetele.com
According to Aldermore, hosting Swyx centrally in its datacentres is much easier and cost-effective to manage its telephony and it can provide secure and resilient customer communications. Elite has delivered a full working and flexible system on time and on budget and continues to act as a strategic partner than can advise us on how communications can support the bank’s future growth.
Swyx supports ‘anywhere’ workers to communicate on any device. Key benefits: • Resilient telephony for staff, intermediaries and customers • Enhanced service with personalised communications • Quick return on investment • Reduced costs including saving 5k per month on conference charges • Easy to manage and maintain • Scalable telephony supports growth • Employees can access phone system at any location or device • Expensive ISDN lines replaced with robust SIP trunking
www.swyx.com
www.aldermorebank.co.uk
ALDERMORE’S PARTNERS Aldermore’s partners are extremely important to the business; Johnson explains who and why the relationships are so strong. Cassiopae – “Our relationship with Cassiopae is much more about supporting the asset finance business, and helping us through the re-digitisation of the asset finance facility to enable improved customer engagement and customer experience.” Six Degrees Group – “They’re a very engaged supplier, working closely with us to try and improve the performance and reliability of our networks and our internet access. They pretty much keep the ship afloat, making sure we maintain our ability to have internally effective operations.” DPR Consulting – “They’ve really worked with us over the years to provide additional functionality and ability to deliver new products to our customer base, to continue to grow our mortgage book, they support us on including new product ranges, property development loans, and continue to work with us on our portfolio and expanding our product offerings.” Newcastle Strategic Solutions (Part of Newcastle Building Society) – “This is a whole service and a trusted partner providing reliable savings products for our customers. They’re a market leader. They do the call centres, the business process elements, and they provide the technology provision itself. “
stuck in any one process and that helps us evolve our proposition and work with them on our evolution. They are very responsive to issues we may have, and help us meet regulatory data requirements.” NetSol Technologies - “NetSol is much more back office. They work very well with us; we have a strong relationship with them in developing capability and products within the asset finance arena. They are willing to come to us with ideas and work with us on how best to improve operational efficiency and bringing products to market quickly.” Server Choice – “They are the ‘steady eddy’ guys. They provide really reliable data centre capabilities for us, as well as monitoring for our infrastructure, and have worked with us to help us grow the organisation over the past five-to-six years.” Rack Space – “This relationship is really strategic. We’re collaborating with them directly to identify new hosting opportunities, efficiencies in provisions, how we provide our infrastructure, and working closely on how we maintain and continuously review our security framework.”
Elite Telecom – “A lot of focus has been on building a proactive relationship to investigate increased opportunities to develop and deliver ITC Infotech – “ITC is a very flexible organisation. internal and external telephony facilities, and They are willing to work collaboratively and flex with work with us a lot on how we improve the a business to try and get the right results. They aren’t reliability and service to our customers.”
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“Transparency equals trust. If we’re transparent, they can trust us – and vice versa” – Paul Johnson
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Software to power a new generation of finance
Cassiopae, a Sopra Banking Software company, is a global leader in finance and asset management software, with 500 customer sites on 5 continents.
info@cassiopae.com www.cassiopae.com
NetSol Technologies - Partners with Aldermore Bank since 2009
www.netsoltech.com
in revenue and profitability has been due to continued focus on the customer,” explains Johnson. “We listen to them through the ratings and review process, which allows them to come back to us and tell us exactly what they do and don’t like. As we review that process we can ensure that what we’re providing is what they expect, and the overall brand becomes more and more known within the marketplace.” As a mostly-digital business, any continuous improvement in the CIO and digital arena reflects directly upon that of the business in general: “There’s no point in us building something which is totally separate from the company’s behaviours and vision,” he says.
2015 The year that Aldermore Bank started trading on the London Stock Exchange
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Alive with technology We are the UK’s leading mid-market converged technology provider, delivering business efficiency, productivity, value and people empowerment.
Richard Taylor Aldermore’s Head of Products, Savings
We ensure all our customers stay connected in an always-on world.
For more information please ring 020 7858 4935 or email connect@6dg.co.uk
www.6dg.co.uk
Six Degrees Group
Any improvement revolves around the concepts of: speed of service, quality of service, the breadth of product offered to the customer, ensuring the customer feels their data is secure, and that when they are engaging with Aldermore, there won’t be any issues regarding their personal information.
Number of staff working for Aldermore Bank
875
“Within the CIO realm, what does that mean? It means that we review the technology continuously. It means we ensure that the reliability of the systems is continuously improving, the performance is continuously improving, and with some of our
partners we negotiate a deal whereby as demand grows, the capability grows, and if it drops off in any area, the actual facility drops again so our cost profile goes back down. How cost relates to our original issues and our growth; that’s how we
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“Transparency equals trust. If we’re transparent, they can trust us – and vice versa” – Paul Johnson
Savings management from the experts Outstanding outsourcing for financial services At Newcastle Strategic Solutions, we’re industry experts in outsourcing for a range of leading financial institutions. We have a long history and a solid reputation for delivering successful financial solutions, specialising in the key areas of retail savings management and systems.
To find out how we can help you, contact us on: 0191 244 2490 solutions@newcastle.co.uk newcastlesolutions.co.uk
Jacques Alard Aldermore
Part of the Newcastle Building Society Group.
Relationship Manager
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maintain flexibility and help the company keep reinventing itself.” Whilst planning for the future in a technological sector is difficult – potentially treacherous, even – Aldermore Bank has a vision for the future to become a onestop shop where customers can acquire the services they need with just a click. How will it achieve that? By moving increasingly into a cloud-based infrastructure. “I definitely see, as the world becomes more digitised, that
technology will move into an on-demand type of model,” Johnson concludes. “That brings up some challenges, but it’s definitely the way things are going. It would be foolhardy not to take advantage of some of the services offered by our partnerships. I think it’s fair to say that in the future, there will be very few services that companies have on-site; we’ll move more and more into the cloud.”
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Aldermore 1st floor, Block B Western House, Lynch Wood, Peterborough United Kingdom PE2 6FZ www.aldermore.co.uk