Mutual of Omaha Bank Utilizes IPS Accounts Payable Solution

Mutual of Omaha Bank is strengthening its customer relationships and better positioning itself in the fast-changing banking industry by integrating an accounts payable solution from IPS into its banking services. 

Mutual of Omaha Bank is a full-service bank providing financial solutions to individuals and businesses nationwide. With more than $8 billion in assets, Mutual of Omaha Bank is a subsidiary of Mutual of Omaha, a Fortune 500 insurance and financial services company founded in 1909.

The Situation

As part of its financial solutions suite, Mutual of Omaha Bank offers services designed to benefit America's 330,000 homeowners associations, condominium communities, cooperatives and other planned communities which preserve the character of homes and provide valuable services and amenities to residents. The typical community is governed by elected homeowner volunteers who appoint a property management organization to handle day-to-day operations. Mutual of Omaha Bank’s services for homeowners associations and property management companies include payment processing, cash management, deposit accounts, card programs, lockbox processing, loans and financing solutions. 

“Our clients need payment options that are secure, efficient and convenient,” said Matt Minchow, Mutual of Omaha Bank’s Chief Payments and Deposit Officer. “That’s where our focus is.”

Mutual of Omaha Bank’s homeowners associations and property management divisions are the bank’s largest, serving clients nationally with increased presence in the western and Mid-Atlantic regions.

The bank began looking for an automated accounts payable solution for homeowners associations and property management companies more than two years ago. Although Mutual of Omaha Bank offered accounts receivable services, its community association clients wanted a solution that would integrate with their legacy accounting applications, which helps to streamline the approval and posting of supplier invoices while achieving better control, tracking and reporting.

This key feature would offer Mutual of Omaha Bank a major industry advantage—many competitors that automated don’t offer accounts payable solutions that integrate with existing account systems.

The Solution

After an extensive evaluation of available solutions, Mutual of Omaha Bank selected Productivity Wrx℠, a cloud-based accounts payable solution from IPS, headquartered in Secaucus, NJ. 

The ability to customize the workflows in Productivity Wrx to meet customer business rules was a major reason that Mutual of Omaha Bank selected the solution, Minchow said. For example, when invoices require approval, users can email them directly rather than requiring the approver to log into the system.  “This keeps the invoice approval process moving,” he explained.

Productivity Wrx stood out for the key ability of integration with legacy accounting systems used by homeowners’ associations and property management companies. “This really makes a difference during the sales process. It makes the solution much easier to use for our clients,” Minchow said.

Productivity Wrx is much easier to set up, compared to other solutions, Minchow said.

Productivity Wrx streamlines invoice approval and posting for the bank’s MutualPay Vendor Invoice Pay (VIP) platform. Productivity Wrx automates the receipt of invoices received via paper, e-mail, fax or digital uploads to the MutualPay online portal, which was developed by IPS.  The solution automatically identifies the invoice, converts it into a standard digital format, extracts and validates data from the document based on pre-configured business rules, checks for missing information, and applies the appropriate general ledger account number. Any invoices that require approval are electronically routed to the appropriate individuals based on predefined business rules. The solution provides accounts payable staff with real-time visibility into the status of invoices. Approved invoices are uploaded to the homeowners associations or property management companyies’ accounting application. The MutualPay VIP solution then pays the suppliers.

The Benefits

The combination of Productivity Wrx and MutualPay VIP reduces the cost and time required to receive, review, approve and pay invoices from suppliers serving community associations.

Homeowners associations and property management companies' process thousands of monthly invoices from suppliers while contending with myriad business rules and processes for how suppliers should be paid, Minchow explained. But the finance departments for most homeowners’ associations and property management companies are less technologically advanced as their peers in other industries. Minchow believes Productivity Wrx and MutualPay VIP “catapult” homeowners associations and property management companies ahead of their peers with an easy-to-use solution that improves back-office efficiency and security by eliminating paper processes, integrating with accounting systems and facilitating electronic payments to suppliers.     

Mutual of Omaha Bank is benefiting from an expanded relationship with its customers.

The Conclusion

“Working with IPS has been a win-win for Mutual of Omaha Bank and its customers,” Minchow concluded. “Productivity Wrx has streamlined the bank’s operations while delivering a service that better meets the needs of our homeowner association and property management customers. Mutual of Omaha Bank customers benefit from a service that is highly efficient and highly secure.”

Importantly, the combination of Productivity Wrx with Mutual of Omaha Bank’s MutualPay VIP is key to the bank’s strategy of offering nontraditional services. 

“Our clients are busy professionals. It’s important to us to help them conduct business as efficiently and effectively as possible,” Minchow said. “Offering services that go beyond brick-and-mortar banking is just one of the ways we can do that.”