Barnsley Building Society case study

Advanced solutions enhancing traditional values

When keeping up with increasing regulation put a strain on its operations, Barnsley Building Society decided to update the way that it communicated – both with customers and between branches.

It needed a comprehensive solution to improve its efficiency – without compromising security or the first-class customer service levels it’s renowned for. Our business consultants created an infrastructure that delivered all the efficiency improvements the mutual society needed, plus solutions to some of its more specific operational issues. Now, it uses sophisticated technology right across the business to maintain and enhance the traditional service values that have made it a success.

Streamlining systems with a tailor-made network

Formed in 1853, Barnsley Building Society has nine branches in the Yorkshire area and an agency network that spans North Yorkshire to Warwickshire. The Society is committed to giving its customers a flexible and competitive service and our solution has helped staff to improve and streamline this approach.

Connecting businesses – intelligently

By discussing what Barnsley Building Society needed face-to-face, our specialists had the opportunity to really get to know the business and understand how it used its data.

Once we had a clear picture, we suggested that a flexible network solution, linking each branch and a disaster recovery centre, would give the Society the fast and secure data exchange that it needed.

Keeping an eye on costs was Stephen Lofthouse, Barnsley Building Society’s Assistant General Manager, IT. “ntl:Telewest Business tends to be more cost-effective than its competitors. We were able to keep existing equipment and that also helped to deliver good value.”

Flexible solutions to suit fluctuating demand

In just a few months, the solution had been smoothly implemented and was already speeding up and improving operations right across the branch network. The Society has achieved even greater flexibility with ntl:Telewest Business’ ‘burstable bandwidth’ facility – a really valuable addition that helps staff to cope during busy periods by increasing network capacity.

Network efficiency can now be easily monitored using our web-based statistics. This lets Stephen and his team identify times when the network is under the most pressure, helping them to spread the demand and avoid overload. “This is a useful management tool and enables us to be more proactive rather than reactive when assessing network performance.”

Communication that takes care of itself

Our hands-on management of the Barnsley Building Society network means that Stephen can run his operation confidently – and with the full support of our expert team behind him. “On one occasion a branch went offline and ntl:Telewest Business was the first to let us know about it, even before the branch called. It means that we are more informed and can quickly respond to resolve issues.”

For a mutual organisation that is proud of its ‘local’ approach to customers, Stephen feels that ntl:Telewest Business is the ideal technology partner for Barnsley Building Society. “It’s good to know that ntl:Telewest Business is a local provider with local presence. Working with ntl:Telewest Business means that we don’t have to go through a third party.”

What it has made possible

With every branch now operating more smoothly and serving customers with greater efficiency, Stephen is delighted by the impact that our solution has had. “The service has made a big difference to the Society’s day-to-day running with better front-of-house performance. The key benefits have been resilience and bandwidth.”

Now, Stephen is looking to the future – and to developing the ntl:Telewest Business solution even further. “In the long term, we’ll be looking to evolve our system to enable combined voice and data capability,” he comments.