Banking and IT

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From The Economist on Banking and IT – worth the read – accurate and interesting.

http://tinyurl.com/2d9bcr8

Big banks need IT reform almost as badly as regulatory change

WHEN Metro Bank, which claims to be Britain’s first new high-street bank for more than 150 years, opens its first branch on July 29th in inner London, customers will notice the lollipop jars and water bowls for dogs. But what really sets Metro Bank apart is its state-of-the-art IT system. New customers will be able to get their account, chequebook, debit and credit cards within 15 minutes, and all the data for each customer will be kept in one place.

That puts Metro Bank in an enviable position. IT at many other Western banks is often a hotch-potch of homemade systems. Banks were the first to use mainframes in the 1960s; many are still using the original applications because it is risky to swap them out. Over the years more and more systems have been slapped on. Banks were often profitable enough to afford big IT teams, writing programs themselves rather than buying off the shelf.

As a result banks tend to operate lots of different databases producing conflicting….