In part one of this series, Point West Credit Union was frustrated with their audit program. Although they were successfully navigating their audits, they spent too much time on the process and not enough on their audit tasks. In part two, they discovered that email and spreadsheets were robbing them of valuable productivity. 

Point West Credit Union started off feeling like their audit process was hazy and confusing, making it hard to see the details. After some investigation, they realized they had a problem: they needed a better vision to see what needed to be done, by whom, and by when.

After some searching, they decided to give Redboard’s credit union compliance software a chance. With it, they were able to change their cumbersome audit environment into an optimized one. Here’s how:

No Special Skills Required

One of the things that Point West was looking for was an alternative to Outlook and Excel. However, an obstacle to switching away from email and spreadsheets for audit management was the learning curve. Point West didn’t want to spend valuable time training to use specialized credit union compliance software to accomplish something they’d successfully done with common productivity tools.

They chose Redboard in part because their audit team was able to learn how to use it in minutes.

Picking up Redboard

Another selling point with Redboard was that the Redboard team was very responsive to input.

Point West Credit Union’s audit program was already sound. They knew what they were doing—their only issue was that the process was taking too long.

Fortunately, Redboard was willing to work with them. Point West’s Audit team and their internal auditor had several conversations with Redboard.

Then, instead of Redboard telling Point West how best to conduct their audits, Point West told Redboard how their program operated. Redboard made sure they were able to deliver the same audit experience as before, but without all the hassle.

Stephen Pagenstecher, VP of Member Experience with Point West noticed that after onboarding, Redboard “allowed them to aggregate data, work on things collaboratively, and then have an audit trail and ability to report” to whomever they needed in a more effective manner.

The Know-How Was There—The Tools Weren’t

“Our audit environment is very similar [to the way it was before], except it works now,” Pagenstecher notes. “And I feel much better about the fact that when there’s an audit, we know that the findings will be loaded in an effective way.”

Their issues with miscommunications, missed items, and version control cleared up after moving to Redboard’s stable, secure, centralized platform. One of the features that Point West likes the most is the audit trail, which helps everybody involved see what changes were made in real time, and why. It keeps the team in the know about the entire audit process.

Also, Point West loved the ease of aggregating and submitting documents. “All the information can just be dumped into report and submitted to the supervisory committee, to the board—much simpler than before,” says Pagenstecher.

There was no relearning necessary—no fine tuning—to move from generic office productivity software to Redboard’s audit tools specific to credit unions. The only real difference Point West’s audit team noticed was that their program “is very similar, except it actually works.”

FREE: Audit Checklist for Credit Unions

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Further Reading

If you’d like to read more about how Point West Credit Union was able to save time, increase efficiencies, and reduce their frustration with the NCUA audit cycle, you can read Part 1 and Part 2 of the series or download the entire case study here. 

Or, if you’re gearing up for an NCUA audit, you can download our NCUA Audit Checklist. It’s the best first step toward successful completion of your credit union’s next eternal audit.