Taking Ownership

I can think of no better example of one of our employees taking ownership than the following account:

One of our loan officer refinanced a vehicle for a member that was originally financed through Ally Bank (formerly GMAC - the financing arm of GM). He was able to payoff the loan and save the member money on interest. After the vehicle was paid off by the credit union he followed up to obtain the title. He was told that he was on his own in obtaining that because Ally did not have it. I suppose he took it personally and decided to take complete ownership. He took time on his lunch hour to drive into Houston to get a duplicate title. In order to complete this on the member's behalf, he first had to have them sign some paperwork. In order to make it easy on the member he dropped by their house on the way to do the title work.

Examples of employees taking ownership happen every day at the credit union. After all, it is one of our service promises. This example, however, shows how far some will go to take ownership of your request. Let us know if you come across an example of one of our employees taking ownership of your request. We'd love to recognize them for their efforts.

Making it Easy to Business with Us

The credit union invests heavily on living up to this service promise. There are obvious technology investments such as online banking, billpay and instant issue Visa Debit Cards that make doing business with Gulf Coast Educators easier. There are other investments such as the Allpoint ATM network that may not be as well known. Our members have access to over 30,000 surcharge free ATMs in the US due to our participation in the network.

The largest investment your credit union makes in order to make it easy to do business with us is our people. Our call center staff continually put up some great numbers in terms of the numbers of call they answer each day so our members talk to person and don't get stuck in a phone system nightmare where it doesn't matter which buttons you push, you'll never get to talk to a human. Our MIS department keeps our systems up and running so that the tellers are able to process your transactions and our online services run almost uninterrupted. Our back office staff works hard and some of them early to make sure your direct deposits make it to your account before we even open our doors.

Our Pearland office doesn't have a drive thru but the employees there have been known to give curbside assistance to those who might have difficulties getting in and out of their vehicles. Each day, our employees try to make it easy for our members to take advantage of all the credit union has to offer. We encourage our members to let us know if there are other ways we could make it easier to do business with us.

Responding in a Timely Manner

Last year we introduced our service promises to our members. Visit https://www.gcefcu.org/mission.php for the complete list of service promises. If you ever feel that we are not living up to any of these, please let us know. It is important that we get feedback from our members.

In the coming weeks, we want to focus on our service promises and let you know what you should expect from us and what we expect from our employees so that we live up to that service promise. This week, we focus on our promise to respond to your request in a timely manner.

As a part of this promise, employees are asked to reply to e-mails and phone calls within 4 business hours. We know there is nothing more frustrating than not getting called or e-mailed back. For this reason, we also try to respond to e-mails after hours and on weekends.

If you call us, you can expect a live person to answer the phone within 30 seconds. Our call center does a very good job of living up to this service promise. They consistently have good numbers to reflect their commitment to responding in a timely manner.

Now it is your turn. Let us know if you feel we respond in a timely manner.

Take Time to Thank a Teacher

This week is teacher appreciation week and for us at Gulf Coast Educators FCU, it has special meaning. We really do appreciate the teachers for being such loyal members. We've bucked the trend and have remained true to our roots: serving the financial needs of teachers & employees of school districts.

It has further meaning for many of our employees who have family members in the teaching profession. We have several on our management team who have spouses or children who teach. So we hope you join us and honor those who teach our children.

A couple of years ago during teacher appreciation week, I visited my high school's website and found that a few of my influential teachers were still there. I sent them a quick e-mail to let them know how influential they were and thanked them for believing in me. So just in case they see this, thank you Harriet Reap for instilling confidence in my writing skills and Lorraine Day for believing in my leadership ability and nurturing that. I invite you to do the same and track down a teacher who has meant a lot to you and let them know. They will certainly appreciate it. I know Mrs. Reap & Mrs. Day did.

Stay Politically Alert

There are a number of things that Congress is reviewing that may negatively impact credit union members throughout the country and then we have two issues that could greatly impact our region specifically.

Visit http://www.capwiz.com/tcul/issues/alert/?alertid=14104801 to learn about key issues that could affect your credit union and our ability to offer our members the best possible solutions.

In a time when jobs are at a premium, we can ill afford to lose one of the major employers in this area. Visit http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/metro/6857710.html to learn more about how the proposed NASA budget could impact JSC and our region. Visit http://goboldlynasa.org/ to learn more about the impact of space exploration and how to get involved. The other major issue is school funding. Some local school districts have been forced to lay off employees to try to trim budgets. These two issues directly impact our membership.

We encourage our members to stay alert to theses issues and make their voices heard.

Start the New Year Securely

Let's make 2010 a safe year. With identity theft and online fraud on the rise, we'd like to share a few simple tips to help you stay safe.

1. You can obtain a free credit report from each of the three credit bureaus each year by visiting www.annualcreditreport.com.
   
   We recommend that members only download one of the three and then four months later download the next one and so on. This is a great way for members to monitor their credit and minimize the effects of identity theft.
2. Reduce the amount of mail you receive which contains account numbers and other important information. The majority of identity theft still occurs via mail and printed documents. Many companies offer this information online. For example, your monthly statements are available online at most financial institutions and utility companies, including your credit union.
3. Keep an up to date Internet security program running. The amount of malware has exploded and should one gain access to your system, it could give a hacker information to everything you type including usernames and passwords. If you are cost conscious, there are free alternatives available such as Microsoft Security Essentials.
4. Educate yourself about the latest scams. The credit union's website has page that is updated but there are many sources to obtain this information such as the Internet Crime Complaint Center.

Have a great suggestion that you would like to share? Either post it here or send an e-mail to info@gcefcu.org