Case Study: Union Trust

Background
Union Trust is a full-service financial institution with thirteen offices serving five coastal Maine Counties: Hancock, Washington, Lincoln, Knox and Waldo. Since 1887, Union Trust has earned a reputation as one of New England's preeminent community banks, a model of remarkable growth based on sound management, responsible innovation and careful attention to the financial needs of its customers.

With the continued growth of Internet banking, the data and voice communications capabilities between branches is a critical component of Union Trust’s customer service commitment. As a result, the institution has a very low tolerance for network down time. As all banks are regularly scrutinized by state and federal agency for network communication reliability and security, Union Trust had to rely on a communications partner that could consistently deliver. However, in addition to the reliability of the network, it was also important for Union Trust to work with a partner to quickly solve problems when they came up. They wanted to be able to talk to someone right away and have confidence that their concerns were being addressed immediately.

Need analysis
In 2004, Union Trust began talking with several local communications providers. They had an existing network configuration that had been operational for several years and had no plans to change. One by one, vendors met with Union Trust, documented their current communication network and built a proposal based on the existing configuration. However, one vendor, Mid-Maine Communications, took a step further.

Cathy Emery, a senior account executive at Mid-Maine Communications put together a proposal that actually suggested taking a different route. After spending time with Union Trust and asking many questions about their business communications needs, Emery was able to develop a solution that would serve the needs of the bank today and tomorrow.

“Cathy and Mid-Maine Communications stood out in the beginning as very different from the others because we were clearly not getting the cookie-cutter approach like the other vendors presented,” said Peter Greene, senior vice president of Union Trust.

As part of the proposal, Emery worked to diagram each of the 64 phone lines that were in place at Union Trust’s Ellsworth main office. By identifying and mapping each line, Union Trust, for the first time, was able to see what they were paying for and was able to immediately reduce costs by eliminating unused capacity.

Solution
Union Trust’s communications needs consist of real time bank teller activity in all 13 branches, ATM traffic at 15 locations as well as Internet based banking activity such as bill pay. All of Union Trust’s specialized banking applications are also run over the network. Maintaining a fast transaction speed is a critical component of its network.

Mid-Maine Communications and its SiteLink IP network increased both speed and capacity at the host site to better handle branch traffic. Additionally, the new design provided Union Trust with the ability to set up one of their offices as a disaster recovery site, further securing their network capabilities. Overall, the new services Mid-Maine Communications installed using SiteLink IP, are much more scaleable than their previous Frame Relay based network, providing Union Trust with more options for increasing speeds. The IP network is also much easier to configure and manage, reducing the cost, time and effort Union Trust’s IT staff must spend on troubleshooting problems.

Because Mid-Maine Communications has its own proprietary fiber communication cables running throughout central and coastal Maine, customers such as Union Trust enjoy faster data communications delivered with the superior customer service of a local provider. In addition to data communications, Union Trust also relies on Mid-Maine for all of its voice service as well. By working together, Mid-Maine Communications was able to develop a customized billing solution for Union Trust that was easy to understand and helped streamline the accounting process at the bank.

With a solid communications platform now supporting them, Union Trust is looking to the future. As new applications and services are developed, they are confident that the capacity, service and attention to detail offered by Mid-Maine Communications will insure any changes will be beneficial and seamless to Union Trust’s valued customers.