PeopleSoft 8 CRM for Financial Services delivers a complete customer view by capturing and displaying the complexities of personal, professional and fiduciary relationships with each customer, says the company.

The application enables banks to slice and dice their customer database so as to align service and responsiveness to their most valued customers. The solution also includes a security model that provides role-based access to account information.

Specific functionality built into the solution enables a financial institution’s support representatives to gain immediate access to a comprehensive customer profile. In addition, customers also have access to their own profile information.

The package is part of the company's development of a vertical market CRM application based on a single product framework with no separate industry codelines.

Ram Gupta, executive vice president, products and technology for PeopleSoft, says: “With a single product framework, PeopleSoft 8 CRM will uniquely support industry requirements around customers and products without the burden of separate codelines."

PeopleSoft 8 CRM for Financial Services will be rolled out in December 2001. Additional pure Internet CRM industry solutions are expected to be delivered in 2002.

Credit Suisse is one of the early adopters of the new PeopleSoft 8 system, following a seven-month upgrade programme billed as one of the largest general ledger projects in the financial services industry. Stefan Hilber, managing director, accounting systems, Credit Suisse Group, believes that the new system wil be future-proofed against growing business volumes.

On average, the banking business units process about 2.5 million transactions and produce 3300 reports daily. The system can accommodate 8.6 million transactions at month end, resulting in 1.2 million journal lines processed in PeopleSoft General Ledger at month end, says Hilber.

PeopleSoft 8 Financials was implemented simultaneously on the IT platform of the banking business units of Credit Suisse Group in Switzerland as well as on the global IT platform of Credit Suisse First Boston.

The roll-out of the new platform coincides with an announcement by CSFB that it intends to implement a $1 billion cost reduction programme, achieved partly through savings in group-wide procurement.