What you could learn from ‘Retail Banking Technology’ by Suresh Samudrala (2015, pages 2017)

Posted by Max on September 4, 2017 in Book reviews | Leave a comment

Technology accounts for an average 25% of banks costs (Gartner IT budget 2017).   Legacy banking systems are horrendously complex.  Built up over decades, with multiple systems added, integrated and removed, CTOs have found it hard to justify the cost of modernizing core banking systems.

In ‘Retail Banking Technology’ Suresh outlines and discusses the main components of banking systems: customer channels (ATMs, web, mobile), managing deposits, lending, payments and enterprise systems (e.g., HR, CRM).  One of the most helpful segments of the book is the chapter on customer master.

A Customer Master is the idea that a complete view of the customer is stored in one place, or is easily accessible.  A single view of the customer is highly desirable, as it makes it easier to identify unmet customer needs and reduce risk by providing a complete view of all of a customers assets and liabilities.  Creating a customer master is very difficult for legacy banks.  Many banks have outsourced products (e.g., credit cards), which means that customer data is stored in many different areas.  Fragmented data makes it incredibly difficult to provide a single view of the customer.

Retail Banking Technology is a short, simple guide to banking IT.  Read this book if you want a simple overview of the technology involved in a bank and in banking.

You can find this book on Amazon UK here.