College and University Case Studies
Albion College Dallas Baptist University Georgia College & State University Georgian College Gordon State College Middle Tennessee State University Missouri Western State University South Georgia State College University of Central Missouri University of Georgia University of Idaho University of Northwestern – St. Paul University of Notre Dame UniversitÊ Paris Sorbonne Abu Dhabi Western Illinois University
Albion College Holding Out for the Best U.Commerce® , PayPath® Worth the Wait for Small Michigan College • Albion, Michigan • Private liberal arts college • Founded: 1835 • Enrollment: 1,700 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment, Cashiering), PayPath® Convenience Fee Service
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he rest of the country may not be able to find Albion College on a map, and probably doesn’t know that it offers some of the best pre-med, pre-law and business management programs available. In the state of Michigan, however, the college of 1,700 students enjoys elite status. “We’re sort of considered Ivy League here in the Midwest,” said Tom Pitt, an Albion alum and the college’s current accounting manager. “Our students and parents demand the best.” After several years in the works, Albion has a campus commerce system worthy of the school’s lofty reputation.
lished in 2002, when Albion converted to an ERP system. “I was always impressed with TouchNet’s products and thought how great it would be to have them on our campus,” he said. Five years and three bosses later, Pitt finally had one that agreed. “He recognized we needed to deliver a better product to remain competitive. Until that point (2009), we had no mechanism for taking online payments.” It may have taken a while to pull the trigger, but Albion got TouchNet’s U.Commerce up and running in no time, and the benefits were immediate.
Persistence Pays
Albion introduced online bill payment in fall 2009. Thanks to a significant communications and education effort, adoption reached approximately 50 percent. The next semester marked the end of paper billing at Albion, adoption was 100 percent, and
Pitt came to the job in 1998 with visions of automating and streamlining the business office through technology. His prior superiors didn’t necessarily share that vision. Nonetheless, he kept alive a relationship with TouchNet he estab-
Open All the Time
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Albion College Authorized Users were on two out of three student accounts. “There was some pushback from a small minority, but most people said, ‘It’s about time,’” Pitt said. His staff probably thought the same thing. There were no more lines of students and backed-up phone lines to deal with twice per year. No more backlogging of normal work in order to work the payment windows. No more manual updating of student accounts. Payments are now made on the students’/parents’ time and processed immediately, and student accounts are updated in real time. “Bill+Payment eliminated the need for four staff members to devote a full day to sorting, folding and stuffing envelopes,” Pitt said. “Add to that the savings on printing and postage, which is about $60,000 per year.” Pitt anticipates even greater savings as more refund-eligible students enroll in eRefunds. Refunds go straight from the school’s account to the student’s designated bank account via ACH. Again, goodbye lines and hello improved customer service. Plus, Albion avoids the need for another vendor and maintains control of the money (and earns the interest) prior to disbursement.
Convenient Cost-Cutting Before implementing TouchNet PayPath Convenience Fee Service, Albion took as much as a quartermillion-dollar hit on credit card merchant fees in a year. It took less than one year to eliminate a majority of them. “Our board of trustees said in no uncertain terms that we could no longer incur that cost of doing business,” he said. “That’s when
we decided to go with PayPath, which saved more than $170,000 in the first year alone, and more than paid for our entire TouchNet investment by itself.” Naturally, credit card payments for tuition and fees trended downward, and the number of paper and electronic checks increased, including those for in-person transactions. Streamlining the check-handling process was the main reason Albion purchased TouchNet Cashiering in the first place, Pitt said, and the more paper checks it converts to ACH, the more it shines. “When we implemented Cashiering, we experienced something totally new: the ability to process all mailed checks the day we receive them,” Pitt said. “In the first semester alone, we processed $4 million in eChecks and cut our check-handling expenses by one-third. We also improved our cash flow and the ability to make cash predictions.”
Sanity and Security As many small-college business offices can relate, Albion doesn’t have dedicated staff for cashiering, PCI compliance and other specialized areas of focus. And like business offices throughout Higher Education, they’re asked to do more with less. “I’m at bare bones with staffing. I can’t get by with any fewer positions,” Pitt said. “TouchNet allows us to focus more on taking care of internal and external constituents and less on payment processing and compliance.” Because the software is hosted at the
TouchNet Certified DataCenter, there is also less need for IT support. “Another thing TouchNet simplified for us is data storage and security,” Pitt added. “There are still things we’re responsible for, but TouchNet mitigates the burden significantly.” As much as TouchNet has lightened the load on the business office, Pitt said the customer service gains are equally valuable. “I think a lot of small school financial officers believe they can’t afford a system like this. Some may think our students and parents don’t need or want it,” he said. “In fact, they have the same demands as students at big schools. For our customers, I want the best product out there. We have it in TouchNet.” l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Dallas Baptist University Convenience and Control, Built Right In TouchNet Raises the Service, Efficiency Bar at DBU • Dallas, Texas • Private university • Founded: 1898 • Enrollment: 5,422 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment, Cashiering, Marketplace, Mobile)
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n an ever more complex and increasingly technical world, administrators and students appreciate simplicity and convenience more than ever. And few universities can claim to give the same level of attention to their students as Dallas Baptist University. Grey Hoff, assistant vice president for financial affairs at DBU, is committed to creating a campus commerce environment that takes care of its own, and that includes helping students and parents make the most of their financial investment at DBU. The commitment to student service took a huge step forward with a recent implementation of TouchNet U.Commerce. Among a host of benefits, the school’s new campus commerce management system enables students to take care of everyday business at their convenience, freeing up more staff and resources for one-on-one time with students with real issues. But there’s more to the story.
One Less Thing to Worry About Students have a lot on their minds – juggling curriculum with a new lifestyle, while also learning a new level of fiscal responsibility – and bills can sometimes fall through the cracks. “Students today have high expectations of what they can do financially online, and we needed to live up to those expectations,” says Hoff. With products such as Bill+Payment and U.Commerce Mobile, students have more convenience with a little less to think about. Hoff describes this combination of products as a “one-stop shop for all our students to manage their finances.” TouchNet’s technology allows students to not only check statements online and on the go, but also receive text message updates regarding payments. They can also arrange a payment schedule, keeping payments on time while saving the university money in paper and postage. | continued |
Dallas Baptist University After hearing the news, Hoff walked into his chief financial officer’s office and said, “I think we made the right decision.”
What the Future Holds
Doing More With Less With mounting growing pains in the IT and cashier’s departments, Hoff happily reports that the TouchNet system has had a positive effect on the efficiency and effectiveness of his own team and all departments connected to TouchNet services. “We couldn’t keep hiring staff,” he says, nor could the school’s cashiers continue devoting excessive time to paperwork and working in an old system they couldn’t get ahead of. Self-automation is built into every TouchNet product in use. For instance, students can set up their accounts to automatically pay bills as they come due, and notices and updates can be automatically emailed or sent via text message to keep them in the loop with their university financials. All of this happens real-time and is posted back to the account. “Now, instead of pushing papers, our staff can truly impact students’ lives,” he adds. “It’s definitely more fulfilling, and a much more effective use of their time.”
Punching the E-Commerce Ticket Another game-changer was the recent addition of TouchNet’s Marketplace product. Hoff says adding it has opened up a world of e-commerce
opportunities across all campus departments, as well as streamlining all types of processing. The initial use of Marketplace was to put in place an online ticket source that served the new stateof-the-art baseball stadium. DBU chose TouchNet Ready Partner University Tickets to administer the online ticket sales. Purchase options quickly expanded to basketball, and then to fine arts events, athletic camps, and even student activities. “Marketplace is just a terrific product all the way around,” Hoff says. “The best part is that it integrates directly with our ERP.”
“We want to save money in the long run, and we can do that with what’s happening at DBU,” says Hoff. Choosing to do business with TouchNet has allowed DBU to take a step back and better analyze its own processes and determine what it can do differently to be more effective and efficient. “It has really allowed us to investigate how and why we do business and to think through our business logic,” says Hoff. “These are exciting times for DBU,” says Hoff. “We absolutely feel that TouchNet has played, and will continue to play, a tremendous role in helping us stay cutting edge when it comes to providing our students with state-of-the-art business processes that simplify their lives and help them make the most of their financial investment in a DBU education.” l
A Good Deal Gets Better Specifically, Hoff is talking about Colleague by Ellucian. Shortly after DBU purchased its first TouchNet products, Ellucian and TouchNet announced the formation of a strategic partnership that brought about the Ellucian Payment Center by TouchNet, a scalable, deeply integrated and expandable solution that unifies campuswide payments.
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Georgia College & State University The More They Put In, the More They Get Out Investments in TouchNet Yield Increasing Returns for Public LAS College • Milledgeville, Georgia • Public liberal arts college • Founded: 1889 • Enrollment: 6,000 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment, Marketplace), PayPath® Convenience Fee Service
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ike a lot of liberal arts colleges, Georgia College & State University’s shrinking budget necessitates doing more with less. And, like many public institutions, that means a lot less. The solution? More TouchNet.
On the Right Path Founded in 1889, GCSU combines the southern charm of Georgia – columned buildings, lush landscaping and tree-lined streets – with the resources of a leading liberal arts university. With approximately 6,000 students, it’s a public institution that looks and feels like a private school, with high faculty-to-student ratios and cutting-edge classroom technology, and also higher tuition. When students and parents started paying for tuition and everything else with credit cards, GCSU started processing fees. The business office was charged with not only cutting those costs dramatically but also addressing growing PCI compliance concerns.
A TouchNet customer since 2004 (Payment Gateway), GCSU looked into TouchNet PayPath after hearing success stories from fellow University System member Georgia Tech. “There simply was no other product that could compete,” said Wanda Ennis, GCSU’s director of student accounts. “We needed to cut costs and get compliant. We saw that PayPath could help us do both.” GCSU implemented the convenience fee service the next semester, and within the first year, roughly $240,000 that would have gone to their credit card processor stayed with the school. And every cardbased tuition payment traveled a secure path, leaving behind no sensitive card data to worry about. The experience was the first of many good things to come over the next year.
Billing Is Less Taxing Next, GCSU sought to end the costly, chaotic | continued |
Georgia College & State University and complaint-ridden process of paper billing. This time, the problem was threefold: Students/ parents were demanding better self-service capabilities, paper and postage costs were skyrocketing, and the business office needed a break – financially and mentally. Enter TouchNet Bill+Payment, part of the U.Commerce System. Traffic jams at the cashier window went away, as did the incessant calls from students and parents wanting to pay over the phone. Not to mention the savings on printing and postage costs, which exceeded five figures each year. “What used to take me two solid days to prepare and send now takes just two hours,” Ennis said. GCSU students are typically high achievers with parents heavily involved in their academic and financial affairs, she added. Bill+Payment’s Authorized User feature enables students to authorize a parent or other third party to access their account, something GCSU could never offer before.
Rethinking Refunds Ennis said many parents also want refunds to go back into their accounts. Before ramping up Bill+Payment’s eRefunds module, that required getting a paper check into parents’ hands via the student. Now, refunds can be received via direct deposit into a chosen account – even back to a credit card. As a result, the volume of costly paper checks was immediately cut in half and continues to shrink. Gone too are the crazy refund lines that occurred for three days every semester. To think it almost didn’t happen that way. Before GCSU purchased
Bill+Payment, the school had planned to outsource refund processing and disbursement to a third-party vendor, one that issued refunds in the form of debit cards tied to new “bank accounts” with the vendor. “We changed our minds once we saw eRefunds,” Ennis said. “We didn’t feel it was right to force another card or bank account on our students, or charge a fee if they or their parents wanted a paper check. TouchNet offered a better way.”
Connected Commerce Early on, GCSU committed to a philosophy of consolidating transactions and centralizing commerce operations. TouchNet Marketplace helped the school apply it to more of the campus enterprise. Marketplace’s uPay module enabled secure online payment sites for housing, parking, event tickets, continuing education, testing and orientation. Because four payment software vendors are TouchNet Ready Partners, there is no expensive customization necessary. Plus, GCSU enjoys streamlined transaction processing and easier payment reconciliation and reporting, along with less risk and simplified compliance efforts. Revenue moving through Marketplace now exceeds $200,000 annually and continues to grow. Best of all, the platform can grow with it.
short time, on a relatively modest investment. Despite the funding challenges – and because of them – the institution plans to leverage more of it. “Our budgets are frozen,” Ennis said. Nonetheless, she said, they recently added TouchNet’s PIN Debit solution. More uPay and uStores sites are on the way too, and more payment vendors will be TouchNet Ready Partners – all in an effort to further streamline and consolidate transaction volume for more economical and secure payment processing. It’s true what they say: The more you put into something, the more you get out of it. l
Up Next With TouchNet’s help, GCSU has accomplished a lot in a TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Georgian College Georgian College, TouchNet Break New Ground in Canada CMS Consolidates Commerce, Establishes First Online Debit • Main Campus: Barrie, Ontario • Public university • Founded: 1967 • Enrollment: 9,700 full-time, 28,000 part-time • Enrollment growth: 35 percent since 2002 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Cashiering, Marketplace, Bill+Payment) • First college in Canada to accept debit card fee payment
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n the campus commerce landscape, effecting real change and achieving real progress require a committed partnership, one in which both parties are willing to go “all in.” From the time Georgian College first engaged TouchNet, the two partners have made increasing investments in each other, with the promise of substantial returns. For Georgian College, the end goal was fulfilling a vision of one system to handle all payments; one that enhanced self-service capabilities for students, slashed the costs of doing business and simplified PCI compliance. For TouchNet, the college proved to be the ultimate laboratory for developing a complete payment solution customized for Canadian commerce. Here’s how they did it.
Campus Profile Georgian College was established in 1967 as a modest storefront operation in Barrie, Ontario. Today, it’s one of the leading colleges in Canada.
With seven campuses, nearly 10,000 full-time and 28,000 part-time students, Georgian is also one of the largest cooperative education colleges in the country. Enrollment growth continues to outpace the national average, especially at the Barrie campus. Georgian’s personality and progressiveness have redefined post-secondary education in Ontario, building an impressive legacy of teaching and learning excellence, innovation, and strategic partnerships.
Fewer and Better When Georgian’s Grant Strasser assumed the role of business systems manager, the college was in the process of reducing the number of network operating systems across all its campuses, from 13 down to two. In line with that initiative, Strasser wanted fewer but better partners in the campus commerce arena. “The savings in staff time has been incredible,” Strasser said. “We saw what streamlining our | continued |
Georgian College network could do and decided to apply the same ‘fewer and better’ mantra to the eCommerce side.”
Carrying the Banner Georgian, part of the Ontario Banner® Users Group, began running Payment Gateway, the first piece of the TouchNet Commerce Management System, in 2004. Reliable, real-time ERP integration was achieved, and it enabled full-time students to pay tuition online, via credit card, for the first time. Within one semester, self-service became the preferred payment method, delivering immediate relief to business office personnel, both at the cashier’s window and on the phone lines. A few semesters later, nearly 30,000 part-time students enjoyed the same capability, and the staff benefits and savings increased “exponentially,” Strasser said. “With Payment Gateway behind the scenes, payments just happened,” he added. “We just forgot about it. It was that reliable.”
Giving Credit to Debit Concurrent with a recent Banner upgrade, Strasser began looking for a cashiering system with the same reliability and integration Georgian had enjoyed with TouchNet. At the same time, the school sought a way to build in debit card functionality, given the reduced processing fees and students’ general preference for debit over credit. Nonetheless, no such solution existed yet in Canadian Higher Education. That’s when Georgian College and TouchNet realized the opportunity to break new ground by building successful integration with Interac, Canada’s
most common processor. Thus, Georgian became the first college in the country to offer debit card payment capability both online and in person. The success with the selfservice debit project proved to be a catalyst for a deeper relationship, as Georgian soon committed to not only the TouchNet Cashiering solution but the entire TouchNet Commerce Management System (CMS). The move centralized Georgian’s fragmented commerce operations into a single, streamlined and secure platform. For TouchNet, it was a chance to enhance CMS for Canada’s unique regulations, payment processors, taxation and tuition funding protocols. “I was amazed at how much development work TouchNet put into meeting the regulatory requirements for Canada, as well as delivering the functionality we wanted,” Strasser said. “Both parties were looking for ways to succeed, and communicating regularly to get it done.”
Progress Meets PCI The challenge of PCI compliance was another motivating factor in Georgian’s decision to go all in with TouchNet, to have one partner handling all payments. Though centralized commerce went hand in hand with PCI best practices, Strasser still expected the process to take two to three years. Instead, it took only slightly more than one year. “We’ve known for years that after July 1, 2010, we wouldn’t be able to
process debit or credit cards unless we could prove compliance,” Strasser said. “Every college and university in Canada has known that, but with TouchNet so key to our PCI initiative, Georgian was way ahead of the game.” In fact, in 2008, when the institution went to RFP for parking, bookstore, athletics and housing/ hospitality payment vendors, responding parties were required to have TouchNet and Banner partnerships, and winning bidders joined the TouchNet Ready Partner™ program.
Betting to Win In Georgian College’s quest for fewer but better partners, Strasser said they’ve found one in TouchNet. Students enjoy convenience and capabilities they never had before. The college saves time, money and staff. Payments just happen, regardless of term or time of year. And Georgian has the commerce infrastructure to meet additional, expected enrollment growth and PCI compliance mandates with ease. “In many ways, we made a bet on the other’s success. It’s been a big win for us and for them,” Strasser said. “We now have a full commerce solution with a single vendor, and TouchNet was able to build a model solution for Canadian Higher Education.” l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Gordon State College Refunds Made Easy Gordon State College Achieves an 80-plus Percent Student Refund Direct Deposit Adoption Rate • Barnesville, Georgia • Public institution, University of Georgia System • Founded: 1852 • Enrollment: 4,000-plus • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Dashboard, Bill+Payment, eRefunds Direct™, SponsorPoint®), PayPath® Convenience Fee Service
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witching from an outsourced program for financial aid disbursements to an internally managed program with direct deposit and printing services was easy for Gordon State College. So easy, in fact, that the college nearly quadrupled its direct deposit adoption rate the first semester it used eRefunds Direct. TouchNet’s eRefunds Direct, combined with the newly available check printing services, provides a single-source solution for student-friendly disbursements, and there’s no need for a third-party vendor. It is a simple, secure and efficient process to streamline Title IV disbursements and refunds. “Since Gordon had purchased Bill+Payment for online payments and billing, we wanted to utilize the product and all its functionality,“ said Sharon Ellis, director of Business Services at Gordon State College. “Transitioning to eRefunds Direct provided a one-stop area for the student, eliminating multiple login points.”
Direct Deposits Made Simple “With our Student Account Center having multiple functions – payment, refunds, deposits, 1098-T, bills – all in one application, students can retrieve account details and set up payment methods. It makes communication much easier,” Ellis explained. TouchNet’s eRefunds Direct is fully integrated into the campus’ system for a continuous automated process. “With all electronic processing, we have reduced our costs by saving on paper, postage, envelopes, and possible overtime of staff. The retrieval of data for the student and the staff is far easier, too.” Since many students start school with an existing bank account, the best solution is to directly deposit money into their existing account. However, there are still students without bank accounts or who choose not to use direct deposit. With TouchNet, Gordon State College can accommodate these students as well. | continued |
Gordon State College
Checks Go Down and Out
More of a Good Thing
“The check printing service has allowed Gordon the opportunity to move away from physically printing and distributing checks on the campus itself, which allows
“The adoption rate of direct deposit eRefunds during the first semester of implementation was around 80 percent, far higher than in the past,” said Ellis.
“ The adoption rate of direct deposit eRefunds during the first semester of implementation was around 80 percent, far higher than in the past,” said Ellis. our Accounts Payable personnel to focus on the other payments and prevents excessive lines at the Business Office,“ said Ellis. “As an added bonus, when students realize the check will be mailed to the address within the system, they are more diligent in correcting the address.” “The quickness with which the checks are printed upon the delivery of the file has been outstanding,” said Ellis. Furthermore, the checks are cleared and settled through the school’s bank, limiting miscommunication and expanding protection against fraud.
Schools like Gordon State College promote eRefunds around campus to ensure the best adoption rate possible. For example, signs were put up on campus with QR codes that took students to the sign-up page for enrollment in direct deposit. “Our Business Office created brochures and answered students’ questions pertaining to the process. We had a banner located in one building on the campus promoting the vendor,” said Ellis.
In addition, each check printed is an opportunity to encourage students to switch to direct deposit. “Students are looking for the quickest and easiest way to receive their funds. TouchNet eRefunds Direct provides it.” said Ellis. l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Middle Tennessee State University MTSU Makes it Mandatory, Simple and Successful Direct Deposit, Bill+Payment™ Deliver Sizable Refund Savings … and More • Murfreesboro, Tennessee • Public university, member Tennessee Board of Regents • Founded: 1911 • Enrollment: Approx. 25,000 • Featured TouchNet technology: Bill+Payment
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ere’s how thousands of students used to get their refunds at Middle Tennessee State University: Over four days, they would take turns gathering in the old student union, waiting in long lines behind makeshift stations set up and manned by half of the business office staff, with printers and boxes of paper at each station. What a difference a few years, a key decision and the right software can make. The university took a huge step forward in 2006 by mandating that students receive their refunds via direct deposit. The following year, when MTSU implemented TouchNet Bill+Payment, the move really started to pay off.
Almost Perfect The direct deposit mandate preceded a Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR)-wide ERP upgrade, which gave MTSU, six other TBR universities and 13 colleges a new student system. A year before the upgrade,
every refund-eligible student had to fill out a banking information form and provide the university with a voided paper check. Account and check routing data were then manually entered into the old finance system. The refund was deposited into the student’s designated account or, if necessary or preferred, issued in the form of a prepaid debit card. So, while MTSU virtually eliminated thousands of paper checks each year, they still had a lot of paper, along with the costs of processing, plus the challenge of storing it securely.
Banner Year The TBR-wide ERP system upgrade came the following year, as did systemwide implementation of Bill+Payment. “When we moved to the new ERP system, our old finance system couldn’t retrieve all the banking information we had collected the previous year,” | continued |
Middle Tennessee State University said Becky Bussell, MTSU’s bursar. “That’s when we went out on our own and purchased the eRefunds module.” MTSU didn’t have to manually collect and process student banking data all over again, or ever again. The self-service eRefunds solution enables students to enter their information directly, and maintain and update their personal banking information at any time. Naturally, there was some pushback from a vocal minority, but Bussell said the biggest challenge for the institution was simply spreading the word to refund-eligible students, which thanks to increasing enrollment, had jumped to nearly 18,000. “A few people didn’t get the emails or see any of our advertising across campus and had to contact us, asking where their direct deposits were,” Bussell said. “But they only had to wait an extra day or two.” For Middle Tennessee, it was a small price to pay for the more than $250,000 it saves with the new refund model. “We now have more than 24,000 students signed up for direct deposit, and no need to store that many paper files containing PII (personal identifiable information),” Bussell said. What’s more, the university doesn’t have to relinquish control of vast sums of money to a thirdparty “bank” twice a year. Best of all, the system is in place, delivering savings and security year after year.
Looking Back, Moving Forward “Two years into it, I think students are very satisfied, plus
we don’t have the lines anymore,” Bussell said. “We’ve definitely recouped the cost of our investment, probably in check stock and manpower alone.” Speaking of staff hours and workload, she summed up the improvements this way: “Our enrollment has grown about 5 percent just since 2008, but we have not felt any impact in the business office.” Bussell also pointed to more than $200,000 in new revenue generated through Bill+Payment’s Payment Plan Manager. And in February 2009, MTSU went live with Marketplace™, enabling and securing the growing number of eCommerce transactions through uPay sites and uStores. “We’re gradually moving every merchant that accepts credit cards into Marketplace if they don’t have their own cash receipt system,” Bussell said. “We
have a long waiting list, but it’s what we have to do from a PCI compliance standpoint. “That’s a big part of why we use TouchNet … to get us there.” Simply, securely and successfully. l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Missouri Western State University Turning Cost Savings into Growth • St. Joseph, Missouri • State university • Founded: 1915 • Enrollment: 6,260 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment, Cashiering), PayPath® Convenience Fee Service, Marketplace, TouchNet Ready Partners
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issouri Western State University’s bursar Dan Eckhoff isn’t just a financial administrator. He also serves as an adjunct professor in the Craig School of Business and teaches classes on finance each semester. “I really enjoy working with students and showing them – with facts and figures – how they’re responsible for the outcome,” said Eckhoff. “For many students, college is the first time they’re accountable for themselves.” For universities using TouchNet products and services, not only are students given more of a chance to become involved in their financial well-being, but their participation also becomes a way for universities to cut costs and create savings.
Payment Problems … Solved “Before we started using TouchNet,” said Eckhoff, “There were a lot of lines. From morning until evening, we had lines of students paying bills, seeking refunds, you name it. Our in-house payment plans were very manual, one for every student. We looked at outsourcing for that first but then we ran into reconciliation issues. “Using TouchNet Payment Plans took the administrative work off of us and placed it into student’s hands, and it worked out very well,” said Eckhoff. At
MWSU, students without financial aid who haven’t paid their full tuition are notified that they will be dropped or disenrolled and they’re given two weeks to resolve the matter. However, if a student has financial aid, has made some but not all of their payments and was not previously enrolled in Payment Plans, they’re signed up for the program automatically and assessed a late fee when the time comes. “It’s much easier to do it at this point than to have to go through re-enrollment or, even worse, collections,” said Eckhoff. For MWSU, TouchNet proved to be a solution to these issues and more. Additional U.Commerce services, such as Marketplace and TouchNet Ready Partners, have solved or even circumnavigated problems for the university. In fact, the annual savings accumulated using PayPath for credit card processing was shifted over to cover student administrative expenses and to build new technology infrastructures within U.Commerce.
Bill+Payment and 1098-T Forms Before spring enrollments began in the fall of 2012, the 1098-T option was implemented within the Bill+Payment Suite at MWSU and the school’s busi| continued |
Missouri Western State University
ness office celebrated an 87 percent adoption rate. “The next semester, we added a memo to the registration agreement system. Only six students opted for paper forms and 5,819 forms were delivered electronically,” said Eckhoff. Using electronic payment services for student accounts offers students online payments, parent pay, stored online payment profiles, access to real-time account balances and account activity, payments scheduled in advance, and real-time posting of payments to the campus ERP system. “The convenience of the program was easy for students to recognize, and they picked up on it quickly,” said Eckhoff, “They connect into the system using a single sign-on. We take advantage of the annoucement side as it relates to financial aid and 1098-T forms.” When asked about great features, Eckhoff mentioned one thing in particular. “One of the great functions of this system is being able to designate an ‘Authorized User.’ Parents and students have wanted that for years.” When parents are calling for the 1098-T forms, they can log in as themselves and print the form, saving time and labor for the business office.
E(asy)-Refunds “In the spring of 2011, we basically made eRefunds mandatory. It started with fliers stuffed into letters with the necessary information, and also posted signage,” said Eckhoff. “Nonetheless, the group that needed the most information was, and remains, incoming freshmen and their parents, so we typically find that freshman orientation is a great chance to explain the process.” That process is working, and MWSU continues to see its eRefunds enrollment numbers in the low 80th percentile, with a goal set for the low 90s. “The student’s options are direct deposit or mailed checks to a permanent address, and a mailed check can be a hassle for parents and students alike,” said Eckhoff. “Once more, students have easily picked up on the technology and we’ve had very few complaints.”
Partnering Up and Future Plans Missouri Western State University continues to expand its Marketplace offerings, primarily with uPay sites. “We looked at storefronts that could be built through the website and we’re seeing that need gradually expand,”
said Eckhoff. “Many departments are expressing interest.” The TouchNet Ready Partner Program allowed MWSU to integrate with online ticket vendor Vendini and online housing payment services company Adirondack to keep these services as easy as possible to use, for students, their parents and campus administrators. For instance, students can apply online and don’t have to bother with paper contracts anymore. Eckhoff noted that he hopes parking services is next. Along with an expansion of online payment options with more trusted partners, Eckhoff hopes to use TouchNet services to be able to take care of the surcharges and tax forms associated with international payments being made with cash. “Our goal moving forward is to make everything as seamless and simple as we can, and our students have responded well to the changes we’ve made already. They’re learning fiscal responsibility and we’re enabling our staff to focus on cost savings. It’s a win-win situation.” Missouri Western State University’s main campus is in St. Joseph, about 50 miles north of Kansas City, and there is a satellite campus in North Kansas City. Both locations offer undergraduate and master’s degree programs. l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
South Georgia State College Small School, Big Payoff Benefits of Streamlined Billing, Payment Systems Aren’t Reserved for Large Institutions • Douglas, Georgia • Public two-year college, University System of Georgia • Founded: 1906 • Enrollment: 1,400 • Featured TouchNet technology: Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment
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usiness offices at big universities aren’t the only ones in need of advanced billing and payment capabilities. And, as many smaller schools have found, they aren’t the only ones who can afford the benefits. Case in point: South Georgia State College. Like most institutions large and small, the college of 1,400 students once dealt with long lines at cashier windows, frustrated students and staff, and mounting costs associated with paper bills and payments. That all changed when a relatively small investment in campus commerce technology yielded sizable returns.
Campus Profile South Georgia State College is a two-year college with a long and distinguished tradition. Founded in 1906 in the town of Douglas, it was the first statesupported two-year college and one of the original institutions in the University System of Georgia.
The college may belong to one of the largest university systems in the country, yet the business office has autonomy in the realm of billing and payment systems. Integrating the Georgia system’s chosen ERP software with TouchNet Payment Gateway gave South Georgia State College the same powerful payment engine as the other 34 schools in the system. Until recently, however, students and staff were still sputtering along with an antiquated online billing and payment system.
One Step Forward … Despite the major efficiencies delivered by ERP/ Payment Gateway integration on the back end, it was mostly the same old song and dance for the end users. Paying tuition and fees remained a stressful process, especially for the 60-75 percent of SGSC students who receive financial aid. Sure, students could make online payments. The outdated Web| continued |
South Georgia State College
based payment platform could accept them, but not much else. The numbers students saw online didn’t reflect in real time the deposits they made, classes they added/dropped or financial aid they received. Nor could parents or authorized parties view important financial data that affected them or their student. Without a proven, reliable and easily navigated online solution, students reluctantly stuck with the old standbys: waiting in line and calling the business office. “Our phones would ring off the hook for a solid week before the start of each semester, everyone wanting to know how much they owed,” said Peggy Dobbs, SGSC’s director of Business Services. “And throughout the registration period, we felt like we just couldn’t help everyone. My staff in other positions would have to leave their jobs to work as extra cashiers. It affected everyone – three times every year.” The hassle and expense of paper billing would always follow, often for multiple rounds as students added or dropped courses, changed addresses or were late with payment.
Solution in Sight
advanced billing and payment solutions had transformed the business office at other institutions. After a lengthy review of the market, she determined Bill+Payment was worth a look. “My boss was aware of our challenges, and once she learned what Bill+Payment could do, she asked for the price,” Dobbs said. “Our request was approved, and we purchased it with leftover funds at the end of the fiscal year.” That was 2006, a year in which online payments at SGSC totaled only $40,000. In the first year after implementing Bill+Payment, online receivables jumped nearly eightfold, to more than $300,000.
Automation Station What a difference a year and the right technology can make. South Georgia now boasts an online, self-service business office that’s never closed: • Automated billing services eliminate paper billing, and the postage costs and staff hours that go with them. • Students enjoy comprehensive, user-friendly online bill presentation, with access to
transactions and account data in real time, not hours or days. • The college’s transactions are swept daily, and the money hits its checking account that night. • Sensitive transaction data and applications are secured in the TouchNet Certified DataCenter. • Refunds stay under the school’s control, and get to students faster. • Overstaffing for peak periods is a thing of the past, as are long lines, backed-up phone lines, and stressed out students and staff. “Today, we can actually help that student who comes to the cashier window during registration week,” Dobbs said. “And we still get calls during peak times, but those calls are people who need real help rather than help with routine business.” “It’s the best investment we have made in a long time,” Dobbs added. “Bill+Payment helps our students help themselves, and it pays for itself.” l
Through peer groups and the conference scene, Dobbs saw how TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
University of Central Missouri At the Center of it All TouchNet Powers Progress, Personal Service, and New Possibilities • Warrensburg, Missouri • Public university • Founded: 1871 • Enrollment: 11,200 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment, Cashiering, Marketplace, Dashboard), PayPath® Convenience Fee Service, PIN & PINless Debit
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hen the Princeton Review names you one of the best colleges in the Midwest four years running, you must be doing something right. In the University of Central Missouri’s case, it’s a lot of things. Student-faculty ratio, affordability and number of degree options are just a few. As Missouri’s lead institution for professional technology, UCM is committed to acquiring and utilizing technology to enhance the university’s comprehensive educational mission. TouchNet has been a central part of that commitment.
Gateway to Good Things Perhaps no one is more qualified to speak to the benefits of Central Missouri’s investment in commerce technology than Director of Student Accounts Donna Bodenhamer. She has worked at the university for the last quarter-century, on the finance side for all but two of those years.
She moved into her current position in 2002, the year UCM first offered electronic payment through its legacy student accounting system. TouchNet Payment Gateway was the engine that made it possible. Four years later, in conjunction with an ERP implementation, the university opted to complete its U.Commerce package and purchase Bill+Payment, Cashiering and Marketplace. “We had so much success with Payment Gateway, and we liked what we saw in the other products. We knew they could enable and enhance other processes,” Bodenhamer said. “Plus, TouchNet was already a partner with our ERP. It was easy to get off the ground because everything was already integrated.”
Paying the Bills Today, nearly 11,000 transactions and $8.5 million in tuition/fee revenue are moving through TouchNet Bill+Payment, rather than in person through the | continued |
University of Central Missouri business office. Students and parents can conduct their campus business anytime, day or night. “We don’t have the lines to make payments or pick up refunds anymore,” she said. “And you can actually get through to someone on the phone.” Why? Because 93 percent of students use the system, 37 percent have an Authorized User on file, and 75 percent have eRefund profiles established that enable refunds to be deposited directly into their chosen bank accounts. Bill+Payment also allowed UCM to offer students a convenient payment plan option, one that’s easily managed and an additional revenue source for the university.
Cashing In, Out Thanks to TouchNet Cashiering, UCM converts more than 11,000 paper checks to ACH these days, out of the 15,000 they receive. Bodenhamer says the school saves many thousands annually on check handling, while the reduced demand on cashiers has enabled her to reduce staff through attrition, redefine some job descriptions and even combine some duties with the financial aid office. “This has opened up a whole new customer service avenue for us,” she said. “Our cashiers have turned into first-line customer service reps, people who are trained in financial aid and understand the process from start to finish. They can’t award financial aid, but they can help students through the process. They can actually solve problems instead of process payments all day. Everyone is happier.”
Free of Fees
online bill presentation, UCM accumulated some hefty credit card processing fees, even when some of the transactions were debitbased. That all changed when it implemented TouchNet’s PayPath Convenience Fee Service. “We used to budget $300,000 to $400,000 for credit card expenses, and it was going up every year,” she said. “We no longer have those costs, and we’re able to put that money back into the general fund.” Credit card payments have been on a steady decline ever since, while the university has enabled three alternative and economical payment paths. Today, 90 percent of online payments are made via the low-cost ACH, and PIN and PINless debit payments are increasing year after year.
Mastering the Marketplace Bodenhamer said with more campus departments jumping on the eCommerce wagon, TouchNet Marketplace gives them a powerful but easy-to-use platform for setting up and conducting business online. Alumni, parking, housing, event registration … all are plugged into Marketplace uPay sites, securing and streamlining payment channels across campus. The university’s Harmon College of Business has even found a way to get students in on the action. Each semester, juniors in the required Integrated Business Experience class form mock companies to develop, produce, finance and market products they create. Student companies with names like “IB Mo Dry” sell items like UCM-
logoed beach towels. Whether it’s stadium seats, bobbleheads, posters or coolers, the products are now sold, shipped and inventoried through Marketplace uStores. All profits are donated to Warrensburgarea charities. “They have given more than $150,000 in just five years,” Bodenhamer said. “Sure, it’s another sales channel for the business students, but really it’s a valuable tool for them to learn how to handle online payments and how the credit card industry works.” For Bodenhamer and Central Missouri, whatever possibilities emerge in the marketplace of ideas, she feels like the institution is well-equipped to make the most of them. “When I travel to conferences now, I no longer need to visit all the vendor booths to see what they have,” Bodenhamer said. “With TouchNet, I have everything I need.” l
During the first few years of TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
University of Georgia Bullish Marketplace Leads to Top Dawg eCommerce Small Merchants, Big Campus Equal Big-Time Revenue • Athens, Georgia • Public university • Founded: 1785 • Enrollment: 35,000 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce® (Payment Gateway, Bill+Payment, Marketplace), PayPath® Convenience Fee Service
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t’s no surprise one of America’s oldest and largest universities supports such a robust eCommerce economy. You would expect a large number and variety of online merchants at the flagship institution in one of the country’s most technologically advanced university systems. The really impressive part? Most of them never need a programmer. To set up and securely do business in a growing marketplace, all they need is TouchNet.
Good for Business In 2005, as Payment Card Industry (PCI) regulations loomed large on the horizon, the University of Georgia started looking for a payment solution for its homegrown electronic student billing system. A University System of Georgia policy of not storing, processing or transmitting payment card data on campus was the driving force. “We essentially had to get the campus out of the in-house credit card processing business,”
said Associate Bursar Therese Hodges. TouchNet’s Bill+Payment suite helped UGA accomplish that goal for student billing, as well as offer new payment and refund options. TouchNet PayPath Convenience Fee Service put an end to hundreds of thousands in credit card processing fees. And everything funneled through TouchNet’s Payment Gateway for streamlined, secure processing. However, more campus departments were jumping on the eCommerce wave seemingly every day. Some were already doing business online; many others needed to set up a store and start selling. No matter their situations, all needed a way to easily take electronic payments online, and process them in the same safe and efficient manner as student receivables. Problem was, few if any of the departments had the IT support to make it happen. “I couldn’t count how many times they would | continued |
University of Georgia complain to us or to the vice president of finance, asking why the bursar’s office didn’t have something they could all use,” Hodges recalled. “We simply didn’t have the resources in our budget … or so we thought, until we saw TouchNet Marketplace.”
Getting in the Game At a campus the size of UGA’s (34,000-plus enrollment in 16 schools and colleges), naturally there are numerous merchants running payment systems independently, with separate software, vendor and contractual arrangements. “It would be great if all departments were using the same platform, but due to the variations in operations across campus, the one-size-fitsall philosophy would not fit the university’s needs,” she said. Nevertheless, Hodges said, Marketplace is home to an increasing share of all campus merchants. Maybe not the campus hotel, nor ticket sales for Georgia Bulldog football games. However, nothing illustrates the benefits of Marketplace more than one of many football-related revenue streams: gameday parking. Many of the university’s parking decks and lots are made available to the public on football Saturdays. In years past, vehicles would have to show up hours before game time to secure a spot, or else wait in long lines prior to kickoff as people slowly paid and attendants let them through. When the lots filled, fans still in line would be left high and dry. Today, every single spot, for an entire season’s worth of games, sells online in a matter of minutes. All the revenue (in excess of
$300,000 annually) goes straight to the bank the same day, instead of over the course of several weeks, helping cash flow and budgeting. It’s just one of many revenue streams resulting from merchant activity in Marketplace uPay and uStores modules. Some other merchants include: • Gift-o-Grams (personalized gifts to students from parents/ others) • State Botanical Garden rentals • “ Dawg” Camps summer orientations • Veterinary school conferences and continuing education The University of Georgia has a staggering number of them – 120 and counting (approximately 70 uStores and 50 uPay sites), both permanent and temporary. The only thing growing faster than the number of campus merchants is the revenue they produce. Four years after implementation, Marketplace revenue approached $4 million, and from day one it’s been handled with the efficiency of direct settlement in the general campus account.
Dashing Success Hodges says Marketplace gives her campus constituents whatever they need to do business online (and even offline, in some cases), whether it’s a full-blown storefront with shopping cart functions and inventory control (uStores) or just a place to seamlessly move customers away from an established Web page to a payment site (uPay) and back again. And best of all, the uStores solution requires no programming, other vendors or more software,
while uPay requires minimal IT development and support to make eCommerce happen. One might think tracking, accounting and reconciling the daily business of 10 dozen campus merchants would be a nightmare for a budget-strapped business office. Not so, Hodges said. The U.Commerce Dashboard shows her and her staff exactly how and where the money moves each day, week and month of the year. “We can tweak the reports to give us exactly what we need or drill down however deep we want to go,” she said. And if there are ever any questions or issues that come up, whether from her own customers or from her support staff at TouchNet, help is always readily available. “TouchNet is always improving their products and service delivery,” Hodges said. “I like how they seek input from the schools, which helps us and them stay in a proactive position, as opposed to a reactive one.” l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
University of Idaho Serving Students, Enabling Entrepreneurship, Conquering Compliance Idaho’s eCommerce Grows, Thrives on TouchNet Platform • Moscow, Idaho • Public university • Founded: 1889 • Enrollment: Approx. 12,000 • Featured TouchNet technology: Payment Gateway, Marketplace
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ince 1889, the University of Idaho has been an institution that expects more from itself, more from its students, more from knowledge and more from life. Add eCommerce to that list, too. With high expectations in mind, the university began in 1999 what has become a lasting partnership with TouchNet. Today, the same initial investment continues to pay big dividends.
Right Decision Terry Quinn, Idaho’s manager of institutional eCommerce, was instrumental in putting all the pieces in place. It started with the launch of online payment functionality through the school’s ERP in 1999-2000. TouchNet Payment Gateway offered the best solution for a processing engine, Quinn said, and as eCommerce took off across campus, partnering with TouchNet would prove to be an even better decision. Soon students were paying online for everything from applications, tuition and fees to campus card
deposits, parking permits and campus events. Alumni gifts also began flowing in through the web. Electronic payments, regardless of where they originated, all channeled through Payment Gateway and hit the ERP in real time. In addition to much less traffic at the cashier windows, the business office enjoyed dramatically simplified accounting and reconciliation, saving countless staff hours and stress loads. Not to mention that students and parents saw that their university was setting the curve in self-service.
Major Benefits, Minimal Effort Naturally, the University of Idaho expected more from its commerce platform and didn’t stop there. Quinn and his team attended the 2000 COMTEC that fall, where TouchNet unveiled Marketplace 1.0. “We talked about how nice it would be to have a solution like that, where our university customers could | continued |
University of Idaho sell whatever they want, and do it without having to go out and contract willy-nilly with a bunch of different payment vendors,” Quinn said. Sure enough, Marketplace achieved Quinn’s desired outcome. As eCommerce proliferated across campus, the number of merchant accounts, applications and associated fees has been kept to a minimum. Instead of having two dozen or more disparate systems to pay for and maintain, Idaho needed only one. “Because we got in on the ground floor and made Marketplace available, campus departments and other groups saw how easy and cost-effective it was. All the hard work was done. All they had to do was adopt it,” said Quinn. And every time other campus merchants get on board, it means one less cash drawer, card-swipe device and daily trip to the cashier’s office. All the transactions are automatically recorded in the general ledger, which takes away expensive manual processes. TouchNet was even able to link Idaho’s central payment application to Marketplace’s uPay module, thereby consolidating $13.4 million of transactions into one secure stream. The aggregate credit card transactions going through Marketplace helped Idaho negotiate a better discount rate and save tens of thousands of dollars each year.
Compliance Comes Easy The move to uPay coincided with the transfer of central server hosting to the TouchNet Certified DataCenter. “Up until that point, we had multiple servers on our campus storing payment data,” Quinn said. “Getting our central payment app, our ERP and uPay to talk to each
other was huge. By moving the ‘pay now’ portion over to uPay, we took every network and associated machine out of PCI’s scope. Otherwise, with 400 to 500 users, we were looking at some pretty serious and expensive compliance work.” Instead, Quinn can handle much of the PCI compliance work himself, without involving multiple departments.
Enterprising Education With compliance issues addressed, without the need for a lot of time or money, Idaho is free to focus on meeting the needs of 21st-century constituents, namely its students and university customers. “Our students today have never known a world without the web. Instant gratification is the norm. They want things right away, and expect to get them. We have to serve those needs instantly and capture the revenue at the same moment,” Quinn said. “We’re also finding new ways to generate revenue as departments around campus engage in entrepreneurial activities they likely otherwise would not undertake.” Quinn points to the increasing utilization of the Marketplace uStores module, which enables his campus customers to set up permanent or temporary eCommerce initiatives, everything from student care packages available from the dean of students to the law school selling raffle tickets for a fund-raiser. In its first full year using uStores, the university generated more than $235,000. “New opportunities come up all the time,” Quinn said. “All we have to do to set up a new merchant is tell
them where to log in and show them how to handle the transactions, and that’s the beginning and end of their involvement. They don’t have to mess with the accounting because of the ERP interface, and they don’t have to sign on to some third-party eCommerce app. Their only cost is credit card fees, but since their transactions are lumped in with the rest of our volume, they’re keeping more of the money they make.” For Quinn, an Idaho alumnus, the proliferation of student selfservice options and eCommerce opportunities is just what he and others envisioned years ago when the university first teamed up with TouchNet. “We’ve always looked for ways to leverage our investment, and it’s safe to say we’ve done that, probably in ways we never imagined at first,” he said. “We’ve been able to create revenue streams and capture existing revenue in a different way. Best of all, with TouchNet, we get the money right now.” Being the University of Idaho, of course they expect even more. l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
University of Northwestern – St. Paul Small College, Huge Volume, No Problem TouchNet Helps Northwestern Answer Higher Calling • St. Paul, Minnesota • Private Christian college • Founded: 1902 • Enrollment: Approx. 2,400 • Featured TouchNet technology: U.Commerce®
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here are several American colleges and universities named Northwestern. Everyone knows the famous one, near Chicago, yet one of its much smaller namesakes is no small player when it comes to online commerce. Like so many similar-sized TouchNet clients, University of Northwestern – St. Paul, used to deal with long lines at cashier windows, frustrated students and staff, and escalating costs associated with paper bills and refunds. In the TouchNet Commerce Management System, Northwestern found a single solution to those challenges, one that could also handle its unique and enormous nonstudent revenue stream.
Campus Profile To understand how a school with around 2,400 students can take in millions in nonstudent payments each year, it helps to know a little history. Northwestern was founded more than 100 years
ago on a philosophy of “faith, learning and living.” Thirty credits of Bible study are integrated into every major. In fact, the famous Rev. Billy Graham, spiritual adviser to many U.S. presidents, presided over the college in the 1940s and ’50s. Sixty years ago, Graham launched the first of 13 listener-supported Christian radio stations now owned and operated by the college. Each relies on listener “Sharathons” to fund its annual operating expenses. Combined, they can generate 150,000 or more gift receipts per year.
Consensus: TouchNet Northwestern and three other Twin Cities colleges formed a consortium for a recent ERP implementation. At the same time, the group shopped for campus commerce technology to hook up to their new ERPs. Out went the RFPs, in came the choices, and then a big decision to make. | continued |
University of Northwestern – St. Paul The four schools vary in size, but all had the same goals: • Automate and streamline the business office. • Improve online services to students, parents and other constituents. • Lock down data and get out of the credit card business. • Save more money, and make more of it. Under those criteria, the TouchNet Commerce Management System was the consortium’s ultimate choice, with the Marketplace™ component sealing the deal for Northwestern. “We looked a little harder at Marketplace, naturally. We saw how it could adapt to and interface with our own custom application to handle the growing online volume of Sharathon donations,” said Jeffrey Wipf, project manager for Northwestern’s Campus Technology department. “While other solutions would’ve been OK for the other schools, we’re doing seven to 10 times their transaction levels. There were too many limitations with the other vendors.”
ROI Right Away Northwestern was the first in the consortium to implement the entire Commerce Management System. It didn’t take long to generate early, positive returns: • Bill+Payment™ eliminated 6,000 paper statements per year, equating to $23,000 in savings. • Payment plan enrollment now generates in excess of $30,000 in new revenue annually. • Implementing PayPath® reduced credit card fees by $80,000 in the first year, and students are trending heavily to ACH. Cashier lines are history, so
staff hours are reduced and Northwestern is now ahead of the services curve with students and parents. All transactions are reflected in real time, so all users know exactly where they stand, and the school’s reconciliation and data request nightmares are over. If the figures above seem underwhelming, remember the radio stations. The local St. Paul-based KTIS alone has been known to raise as much as $4 million during a single Sharathon event. Equally important, the millions in donations now travel through the same certified PCI-compliant channels as the school’s other revenue streams. Yes, it created a streamlined, secure platform for Sharathons, but now the school has a single solution when other campus merchants want to jump aboard. There’s no need to manage (and pay) multiple vendors, maintenance agreements and licensing fees. The platform is there, just waiting for new merchants. “We have quite a lineup of new things
in the works for Marketplace, both uPay and uStores sites,” Wipf said. “TouchNet has already shown it can work for us, and work with us. We’re looking forward to leveraging what has already proven to be a smart investment.” l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
University of Notre Dame Notre Dame Marketplace Plays Like a Champion, Every Day Conversion to TouchNet Boosts Capacity, Performance and Compliance • Notre Dame, Indiana (South Bend) • National, private Catholic university • Founded: 1844 • Enrollment: 8,371 undergraduate, 3,362 graduate • Featured TouchNet technology: Marketplace (23 uStores, 4 uPay sites) • Consistent Top 25 ranking, U.S. News & World Report, Princeton Review, TIME, Kiplinger’s and Kaplan/Newsweek
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lay Like a Champion Today!” It’s the famous sign every Fighting Irish player touches before taking the field at legendary Notre Dame Stadium. While gamedays are a cherished tradition at Notre Dame, there are only a handful of them each fall. In the Notre Dame Marketplace, however, every day is gameday. Since bringing TouchNet into the program, Notre Dame has shaped its eCommerce system into championship form.
Success Stalled In 2005, the university was in year two of its wildly successful Notre Dame Marketplace, a burgeoning eCommerce site for students, faculty and alumni. Merchants were multiplying, as were services and new revenue streams. It became clear they would soon outgrow the system behind it. Then PCI mandates began to surface, and suddenly the system’s challenges were no longer limited to capacity. “Part of the issue was the way the application was
written, how it queried our database, and part of it was the hardware we were using,” said Jeff Simko, manager of ND Marketplace, who is also responsible for the university’s PCI compliance program. “We simply weren’t able to handle a significant number of users at once.” Simko said the limitations were infamously exposed in April that year, in the days leading up to Senior Week, another big tradition at Notre Dame. For the first time, 2,000-some seniors could secure their tickets on the ND Marketplace. And they seemingly all tried at once. System meltdown. Services sacrificed. Efficiencies lost. But again, capacity wasn’t the only driver to begin the search for a new solution. “Our system was highly customized and hosted here on campus, in our own data center,” Simko said. “We knew making it PCI compliant wasn’t going to be easy.” | continued |
University of Notre Dame The Search Is On Even before PCI came along, the university had a formalized store request and implementation process for Notre Dame Marketplace, whereby proposed e Commerce merchants and activities were vetted for potential risk. The security oversight process became even more complicated with looming PCI compliance deadlines. By 2007, Simko put together an RFP for a new commerce partner that could meet the capacity and compliance objectives. “Those two primary drivers kept TouchNet in the running from the start,” he said. “They were obviously taking PCI very seriously and were certified as a compliant provider. They also told us they could handle the high volumes we required, and showed us load-test data that supported those claims. Plus, several hundred schools were already supported by their data center with no problems.”
Marketplace2 By January 2008, ND Marketplace was running on the TouchNet Marketplace™ platform, with payments securely funneled through TouchNet Payment Gateway™. At the time of implementation, there were 13 merchants. Now there are 27; everyone from the Irish Shop to the Society of Hindu-Christian Studies. Most are uStores, TouchNet’s end-toend storefront solution; a handful of existing merchants simply employ the uPay module to handle payments. Simko said. “TouchNet gives us the ability to add merchants easily and without any incremental cost. Unlike our previous system, whether
we have two or 200 merchants, and whether they’re selling one or 1,000 items a month, we have the same hosting and licensing fees, and no transaction fees.” More revenue, greater system capacity and functionality, improved customer service and back-office efficiency, and simplified compliance – all have come to fruition since ND Marketplace met TouchNet Marketplace. After partnering with TouchNet, ND Marketplace’s total revenue climbed 48 percent in 2008, while order volume grew by 113 percent, when compared to 2007. “What was once available only to customers in South Bend is now available around the world,” Simko said. “Yes, that means more revenue, but equally important, it’s revenue that’s transacted securely. Not to mention that we used to manually process many check orders and create reports. Now TouchNet Marketplace does it automatically.” The security oversight process that each new merchant was subject to has also been streamlined. “It’s a quicker review process, with fewer things to dive into and think about as long as they’re running through TouchNet,” he said.” Credit card numbers are never touched or transmitted through Notre Dame servers.”
Community of Champions Simko said the conversion to TouchNet Marketplace has exceeded the objectives and criteria put forth in the RFP. He also said the benefits transcend capacity and compliance. “TouchNet’s familiarity with Higher Education has proved to be
a more significant benefit than I would’ve anticipated,” he said. Among several examples, Simko cited specialization as foremost. “There are thousands of shopping cart options out there, but very few that are developed specifically for Higher Education,” he said. “For instance, ours can link directly to our active directory, meaning we can authenticate users and thus create private stores only for people affiliated with the Notre Dame community. There is no way we could do that with other out-ofthe-box applications.” Other benefits came to light after implementation. “Since we already have Payment Gateway and Marketplace, there is the opportunity to expand to the rest of TouchNet’s product lines,” he added. “There are built-in economies of scale there, and more opportunities for improved efficiencies.” Finally, Notre Dame can leverage the investment by utilizing the legions of fellow TouchNet clients. “The community we’re now a part of is a tremendous asset. COMTEC and Straight Talks connect us to TouchNet experts and other universities that can help us, and we can help them.” In the community of Higher Education, that’s what champions do. l Visit marketplace.nd.edu.
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com
Université Paris Sorbonne Abu Dhabi Student Body Represents Over 65 Countries New Middle East University Solves International Payment Issues With Bill+Payment™ Client • Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates • Private university • Founded: 2006 (parent university in France founded in the 11th century) • Enrollment: 700+ students • Featured TouchNet technology: Bill+Payment
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he Université Paris Sorbonne Abu Dhabi is a relatively new Middle Eastern campus of the famous Paris Sorbonne. Dating back to the mid-11th century, the Sorbonne is today arguably the foremost institution of higher learning in the world. The striking satellite campus opened in 2006 on Al-Reem Island and was built from the ground up. The methodology, education and degrees of this state-of-the-art institution are entirely in French and issued from the parent university in Paris. But the university wasn’t the only thing that was new. The island itself had only recently been created and there was no electricity and very little infrastructure initially.
Payment Challenges From the Beginning Although enrollment is small at present, the challenges are large. In fact, they are of global proportions. As the institution has grown and parents from more and more countries have
enrolled their children at the prestigious university, it became increasingly obvious to Chief Information Officer Muhammad Javeed that a sophisticated payment system was required. After all, the university’s goal was to be able to seamlessly process credit card payments from all over the globe. “We collected all payments manually in the beginning, which was time-consuming and inefficient, but there were many other challenges as well,” said Javeed. “Here in Abu Dhabi, only credit cards from the immediate region were accepted; neither students nor parents could use credit cards from other parts of the world.” As a result, there were a lot of cash transactions. But that led to other problems. “Frankly,” chuckled Javeed, “parents were sending tuition money to their kids but it didn’t always end up with us.” As a result, many students were reaching graduation with huge debts. | continued |
Université Paris Sorbonne Abu Dhabi Previous Success Made TouchNet the Obvious Solution Javeed knew there was a simple solution to the problem from a previous relationship with TouchNet, when he was director of IT services at Qatar University. So in mid-2011, he contacted TouchNet and set in motion the process of modernizing the university’s payment system. “The process of converting to the TouchNet Bill+Payment client was a smooth, step-by-step process with no hiccups,” Javeed said. “TouchNet was able to connect the university to the local banking system through our existing bank. This enabled the university to seamlessly accept payments from anywhere in the world, with dramatic savings on labor and time in the business office.” “It worked like a charm,” Javeed emphasized. “You don’t have to have any special knowledge to adopt the system. The Sorbonne in Paris doesn’t charge tuition, so our campus was the university’s first experience with collecting money.” With the introduction of the Bill+Payment client, the university was able to reduce student debt by over 80 percent. “This made everyone very happy,” said Javeed. “So now, parents and students can make payments at their convenience, anywhere, anytime and with virtually any credit card.”
Security is No Longer an Issue “TouchNet has the best security infrastructure, in my opinion,” Javeed said. “The students’ accounts are very well-protected and that is a very important issue.” Instant access to information is another benefit of the Bill+Payment
client. “Now, students or parents can make a payment and immediately see that it has been posted and what their current balance is,” stated Javeed. “They used to have to wait a few days for accounts to be updated manually.”
Everyone is Pleased With the Outcome “Paris-Sorbonne Université has a rich history over several centuries and a reputation that cannot be compromised, irrespective of location. It’s imperative we maintained their global standards of excellence,” said Javeed. The Abu Dhabi campus was founded with the intention of
making it the preeminent learning institution in the Middle East, and it’s arguably the most internationally diverse university in the world, despite its small enrollment. TouchNet has succeeded in meeting the university’s lofty expectations and unique challenges. “Parents are happy, students are happy, we’re happy and, importantly, the university and its leadership in Paris are happy,” concluded Javeed. l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 USA Tel: +1.913.599.6699 | Fax: +1.913.599.5588 Email: international@touchnet.com | Online: touchnet.com
Western Illinois University How to Overcome an Unwanted Legacy Seek-N-Secure® Helps University Clean Up 25 Years’ Worth of Problem Data • Macomb, Illinois Moline, Illinois (commuter campus) • Public university • Founded: 1899 • Enrollment: 13,400 • Featured TouchNet technology: Seek-N-Secure®
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ccording to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, nearly 350 million records containing sensitive personal information have been compromised in data security breaches since January 2005. Western Illinois University accounted for 180,000 of them after a multiserver hacking incident in June 2006. Following the breach, the university went to great lengths to secure the personal data in its system from that day forward. Little did the school know that plenty of potentially damaging data was still lingering from long ago. TouchNet Seek-N-Secure helped them find it.
Data at Rest, Campus at Risk Michael Rodriguez, Western Illinois’ chief technology security officer, hypothesized that if the 2006 breach happened today, the university could be looking at a multimillion dollar expense, based on a 2009 Ponemon Institute study that reported an average of $204 per compromised record.
Following the 2006 breach, the institution made major investments in data security technology and strategy. It created a C-level security position and brought in Rodriguez from the banking world. It also instituted a policy to protect student Social Security numbers, which for years had also been used as student ID numbers. “That was a great first step,” Rodriguez said. “The problem was, there was no systematic universitywide effort to enforce its data protection policies by proactively dealing with sensitive legacy data.” Eight months into his job, while investigating a virus that infected a number of university computers, Rodriguez and his team discovered that several of the machines they examined had Social Security numbers stored on the hard drives. “At the time I didn’t know the full scope of the situation, but I suspected we had a problem.” | continued |
Western Illinois University Affordable Agents It stood to reason that if the 10 machines he analyzed housed sensitive legacy data, many of the university’s thousands of computers did too. Rodriguez used the consumer version of well-known ID theft detection software to scan those 10 PCs. To systematically scan every campus computer, he would need the enterprise version, which carried a prohibitive price tag. However, after talking to TouchNet at the 2009 EDUCAUSE security conference, Rodriguez learned of an effective, more affordable option. “We had a pretty substantial legacy data problem, and I saw that the Seek-N-Secure product would potentially allow me to tackle the entire problem instead of only the portion we could afford in these economic times,” he said. TouchNet arrived on the scene that summer to install the consolebased Seek-N-Secure (SNS) system and to assist in pushing the SNS agents to the first wave of machines to be scanned.
Lots of Needles, Haystacks The university computers, both PCs and Macs, are all over campus. Rodriguez and his team started with the most active everyday machines of faculty and staff. Notices were sent to university employees, informing them that scans would be taking place and that the agents would be searching for Social Security and credit card numbers. Here was the typical response he heard: “Oh, you’re not going to find anything on this computer.” But in fact, in this first phase of proactive scanning, Social Security numbers were found in
roughly 40 percent of the hard drives, and one in four contained credit card numbers. “Some were older machines, some were newer,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t think universities are any different than large companies in that employees take their data with them as they move from position to position, or leave it on machines that others inherit. Few people pay any attention to data under their care, and even fewer will actively manage their data.” When the first round of scanning was complete, Seek-N-Secure found and helped clean more than 25,000 credit numbers and well over 1 million Social Security numbers. “The numbers got large pretty quickly,” Rodriguez said. Rodriguez saw enough in the first round to recommend ongoing regular scanning. “I felt like we were well on our way to curing a 25-year-old problem in just seven months of intense work,” he said.
Keeping it Clean In addition to proactive, systematic scanning, Rodriguez said Seek-NSecure is a good forensic tool. “If we have an incident with a computer, we can use SNS to analyze the data on the machine,” he said. “And we can periodically rescan machines in areas that regularly use this type of data. I don’t think we’ll ever get away from it completely, but I try to get people who have this data to understand their responsibility and proactively work with us to protect it.” In conversations with his peers at other colleges and universities, Rodriguez sees greater awareness of the
risks associated with data at rest, but not a lot of action yet. “I think universities in particular are hesitant to deal with legacy data like this,” he said. “It’s a daunting task with very real political implications, but it has to be dealt with. I tell them to use a product like SeekN-Secure and begin telling their own story.” He added that university buy-in is critical, especially at high levels. “I work to find ways to communicate to upper management that we’re dealing with the issue of sensitive legacy data on university computers, and that for a change we are actually ahead as an institution of legislation like the upcoming Identity Protection Act in the state of Illinois,” Rodriquez said. “I use numbers a lot … like credit card numbers being in 25 percent of our machines. I tell them that on average it costs $204 to report one compromised record, but I can find and clean the same record for just pennies using Seek-N-Secure.” l
TouchNet Information Systems, Inc. | 15520 College Blvd., Lenexa, KS 66219 1.800.869.8329 | +1.913.599.6699 | touchnet.com