The world of software can be a pretty confusing one. There are a lot of things to know, a lot of things to learn, and a lot of things to forget from using other kinds of software. One of the most interesting pieces of software, in our opinion, is cash management software for banks.
This kind of software, like almost any other kind of software, can be incredibly powerful if put into the right hands. The biggest challenge is understanding how it works and how to get it set up properly.
You might have heard of cash management software being used in other industries. Maybe you’ve even worked for companies that use this kind of software as a part of their normal daily operations, for better or worse. If that is the case, you probably have a good idea of how this kind of software works.
Whether you have an understanding of how this type of application works or not, if you’re reading today’s article, you’ve probably got some questions about how it works for banks. That, or you’re a weary internet wanderer that ended up here by means that you don’t fully understand.
Regardless of which role you fit into, let’s look at how cash management software works for banks and other financial institutions so our curiosity can be satiated on this topic once and for all. There’s a lot to know on this topic, so let’s get into it and find the answers that we’re all searching for.
Table of Contents
Moving A Lot of Money
Banks, credit unions, and other financial institutions deal with a lot of money on a daily basis. Odds are, these institutions handle more money in a day than you make in a year unless you happen to be really well off.
Larger banks, on average, make $50 billion a year off of interest alone. That’s almost $140 million a day in profits, without even looking at the other ways that banks make money. That’s more money than most people make in a year every single day, without looking at things like:
- Stock market investments.
- Banking fees.
- Interchange fees.
On top of that, people let the banks hang onto their money for them and that can be a nearly unlimited amount of money that they’re able to realistically use however they see fit, so long as they give the money back to their customers when they ask for it.
Let’s say you deposit $50,000 into your savings account. The bank now has that money in their hands to do as they see fit. Then, someone else comes and wants $50,000 for a business loan. They use your money to loan to that person and collect interest on it, and that’s the biggest way that banks make money.
Now, that’s just looking at two people. The average bank has 3,500 checking accounts per branch, with people that have varying amounts of money as well as different days that they get paid and different kinds of loans that they have to take out.
That’s a lot of money for banks to deal with, and it requires an immaculate level of record-keeping in order to make sure that they’re keeping everything straight. As a bank, keeping things in order is important if you don’t want to get sued.
Keeping Track of Vendors
Every company, no matter what industry they work in, has vendors and supplies that they need to deal with. Some companies don’t need the help of many other businesses in order to keep things running efficiently.
Other companies require a lot of outside help for a lot of different things. For example:
- Logistics.
- Online presence.
- Swag to give to customers.
- Meeting places.
- Supplies.
- Goods.
- Various services including:
- Cleaning.
- Customer relations.
- Marketing.
Some companies have hundreds of other companies that they have to work very closely with in order to make sure that their operations are working the way that they’re supposed to. It can be tricky to keep track of all of these things, and that’s why so many companies opt to use a piece of software for this. You wouldn’t believe what a good piece of software can do for this.
Companies that use software to help them with their vendors, suppliers, and other contractors usually see a lot of improvement when it comes to the efficiency of their company. Not having to manually keep track of all of these things can make your life a lot easier.
That being said, there are a lot of companies that just use a spreadsheet to keep track of this kind of stuff. That can work pretty well, but it cal also spell out disaster for your business if the person in charge of keeping track of these things is bad at their job.
That’s one of the biggest reasons why a lot of companies use a piece of software for this. Taking the human element out of menial tasks can take out a lot of errors that you could normally expect to just be a part of running your business.
Although, someone who’s good at using spreadsheets and is a meticulous record-keeper can still do an excellent job. If that’s who you have in charge of this task, the only thing that you’d really stand to gain is shaving a bit of time off of your record-keeping process.
That bit of time can really add up. 5 minutes a day is 25 minutes a business week and 100 minutes a month. That’s over an hour and a half of time that you have to pay for that could potentially be cut out every month if you use the software correctly.
That being said, a piece of software is only as good as the people using it set it up to be. If you set up the software incorrectly you could see it performing less efficiently than the person who was just using a spreadsheet to keep track of all of that information.
Automation Saves Time
Doing things takes time. Realistically, doing anything takes time. Getting out of bed, driving to work, picking out clothes, even writing this article takes time. Time is a very finite resource and that means that finding out how to save time on any given task is important.
That importance only compounds when you own a business. This is because you have to pay people for their time. That means that every task costs you a certain amount of money, even if it only takes a couple of minutes to complete in normal conditions.
As we touched on, even 5 minutes a day adds up to over an hour and a half a month. That might not seem like much time, but what if a task could have a whole hour shaved off every day? That’s a lot less insignificant than the other number.
One hour a day translates to 5 hours a week, 20 hours a month, and 240 hours a year. That’s 6 whole weeks of a 40-hour job a year that’s being used for a task that could potentially be done more efficiently with the use of a piece of software.
This is where automation comes in. Automation is incredibly powerful when used correctly and can help with a lot of different mundane, repetitive tasks. These repetitive tasks are typically the ones that are costing you the most to have done for a lot of different reasons, but there is one reason that shines above the rest.
While these tasks may be easy, just like everything else, they take time to do. By using automation to cut back on the amount of time that your employees need to spend doing this sort of task, and thus, save you a small fortune.
Cash management software is able to offer all sorts of solutions for automation and making simple tasks happen that much more quickly. In fact, sometimes you can even just let it do the simple tasks and just double-check its work after it finishes. It could even work overnight while no one is in the office if you need it to.
This kind of software provides all sorts of other perks that can help make your business run more smoothly, both by way of automation and other methods. That’s why so many banks enjoy using this kind of software for their regular operations.
Getting the Most For Your Bank
Figuring out how to optimize operations in a bank can be complicated because of how many moving pieces there are. Banks deal with a lot of things, potentially more than most people realize when they think about it from time to time.
Fortunately, there is software out there today that can make banks run a lot more smoothly than one could ever imagine. All you need is a good piece of software and the ability to set it up in a way that will make sure that it works as well as possible for your company.