Jeff Visser, chief retail officer of Consumers Credit Union, joins us to discuss the reopening of our offices as life begins to return to the “new normal” after COVID-19.

Listen today for all the details! Money, I’m Home!

 

[transcript]

00:07 Lynne Jarman-Johnson: Money, I’m Home. I’m Lynne Jarman-Johnson with Consumers Credit Union. Thanks for joining us today. From finance to fitness, we focus on it all. Today, we have a great interview today, too. Really, we’re very excited about, and it’s about re-opening of the offices after “Stay Safe, Stay Home” is being opened up in phases. And, our Chief Retail Officer, Jeff Visser, has been really on the front lines of making sure that our members and employees are staying safe while staying home, but now it’s time to get back to work, Jeff. How’s it going?

00:41 Jeff Visser: It’s going really well, Lynne, thank you so much. We’re really excited for the next phase of our re-opening here.

00:47 LJ: You’ve been with the credit union for years and have been really in so many roles. Has it just been the most amazing time in your life to be a part of Consumers?

00:58 JV: I’ll tell you, Lynne, I’ve been with the credit union for 19 years now. And you’re right, I’ve worn a lot of hats in that period of time, and just about every member-facing position that we have. And, this is such a unique time for our credit union. And as difficult as some of these days have been, it’s really brought us closer together, and it’s really shown us what a unique and wonderful team we have. We’re so committed to doing whatever it takes to take care of our members. It’s humbling.

01:25 LJ: It really is. I remember thinking back to mid-March and the drastic change that happened in every one of our lives, if you’re listening, whether it was your home life, your work life, just drastic changes that transformed us all. Jeff, how are we prepared, and how did you help lead the team into helping calm fears, but then also continue to just excel in member service?

01:55 JV: Yeah, it was interesting, Lynne, because we were really, in a way, very well-positioned for this pandemic. Of course, we didn’t envision it, but we had made investments as a credit union, and we had just recently finished one of them on our interactive teller technology in all of our drive-throughs. And if you haven’t used them, it’s like an ATM on steroids. You press the screen and “poof,” magically there appears a live person, remote from another location, ready to serve you. And they can do anything basically that any of our tellers can in any of our offices. And so, it was really good timing that we had finished that just not long before the pandemic began. And what that allowed us to do was to continue uninterrupted service to our members at all of our locations’ drive-throughs. And that was a tremendous blessing for us.

02:42 LJ: You mentioned that they’re in remote locations. Some people will say, “Well, wait a minute, does that mean they’re out-of-state, local?”

02:51 JV: Oh yeah, good point, Lynne. No, all of our team members live here in West Michigan, and the digital service center is the name of where we house those folks. Traditionally, that is in our headquarters in The Groves in Kalamazoo, Michigan. With the pandemic, we did have to make some adjustments, and we were able to create secure links to employees’ homes, so that they could continue to serve our members, even from their home under the Governor’s orders.

03:21 LJ: That’s just incredible. So now that all of a sudden, we are all blinked, and we get to safely open. And it sounds to me like we are an essential business, have run consistently through this, but there is a change now in having people coming back to work and also members back into our offices. Tell us a little bit about that.

03:46 JV: Yeah, we’re very excited for this phase, because we’re very much a relational organization. We pride ourselves on the relationships we have with our members. We know them. We know their businesses. We know their work. We know their stories. In some cases, they’re some of our best friends, and seeing them face-to-face, well, it just … It can’t be beat. It’s who we are, and we love it. And so, this has been tough on our team to not be able to see our members face-to-face, so we’re very excited. 10 of our locations will be reopening on June 15. Those locations include South Haven, our Riley office in Holland, our 54th Street brand new location in Grand Rapids, our Plainfield office in Grand Rapids, our Corner @ Drake office in Kalamazoo, our Center Street office in Portage, our Gull Road office in Kalamazoo, and our Mattawan office. We’ll also be re-opening our Battle Creek and our Coldwater locations.

04:47 LJ: And all offices will continue to have the drive-through interactive tellers and ATMs, correct?

04:53 JV: That is correct. All offices will continue to operate their drive-through interactive teller machines at all locations, all lanes.

05:02 LJ: So, a member walks in to our new 54th Street office, [chuckle] it’s so exciting, what differences can a member expect when they walk in? There are guidelines that we’re following.

05:17 JV: Absolutely. And as part of our return to work plan, we have put some differences in place. So, it will look and feel a little bit differently. You will see a greeter at every location. That person that will be there to find out what each member needs and direct them accordingly. We do have limits on the number of members in the offices, so they might ask them to wait just a moment for that member before them to leave. You will see that all employees will be masked, and we will ask that members do the same. You will also see some plexiglass shields in certain locations, and of course, additional cleaning and sanitizing equipment.

05:54 LJ: You mentioned masks, and I know that there is that conversation about people feeling uncomfortable, but this is truly about the safety for not only you walking into our office, but employees as well.

06:07 JV: Yeah, we’re definitely making sure that we err on the side of caution here, and that this is to serve our members well and enable us to continue to serve them well. Hopefully, it’s not forever. We know it won’t be. But yeah, it can feel a little funny, that’s for sure, but we’re just honestly happy to get face-to-face with folks again.

06:25 LJ: You know, Jeff, when all of this happened and we gave different tools to our members to use, it often struck me as almost surprising, but I guess not. For those who don’t use technology much, boy, what a change in being able to utilize technology so that you can still bank and not have to visit an office, even though we welcome that.

06:54 JV: Yeah, you said it, Lynne. It was interesting timing, too, because we had just finished upgrading our online and mobile banking technology. And with some of those upgrades, it got even easier to do some of the routine things that members would often come see us for in person, such as to make a loan payment or to deposit a check. Well, now with mobile deposit technologies, that take a minute. I can deposit my check faster than I can get in the car to drive down to the credit union. The same is true for just making a routine loan payment. Many of our members bank with us, they’re transferring from their checking account to their loan account here, but many don’t, too. They just have the loan. When they wanna debit their institutions or their other bank or credit union, that, too, just takes a minute now. So, there are lots of options for folks if they would maybe not feel comfortable coming to see us just yet.

07:45 LJ: I’m laughing because a business owner texted me one day feeling guilty because they had a lot of checks that they were going to be depositing and said, “I feel bad because I’m gonna take up the line for quite some time,” and I went back and forth with the business owner, and what was interesting was all of a sudden, it was, “Well, have you considered doing night drop?” which is like old school, right?

08:14 JV: It sure is, it’s kind of both ends here. We’ve seen members adopt new technologies such as mobile deposits and making a loan payment online, but it also surfaced things like our night drop which gets checked every day at every location, and it’s a very convenient way if you don’t wanna wait in line, you can drop a check or cash deposit in there, or if you’ve just got a bunch of items and it’s just gonna take too long in line. And our team is more than happy to process that, and they’re really quick at getting that into the account.

08:47 LJ: It sounds to me, Jeff, that I think we have worked just so strongly on making sure people can bank the way they want when they want, with COVID and with “Stay Home, Stay Safe.” It became, you can bank when you want to, perhaps not how you wanted, as far as face-to-face is concerned, but have you found that there has been a drastic change or a slower change in adopting to new technologies and new ways of banking?

09:20 JV: Yeah, we’ve definitely seen a vastly increased appetite for members to use our online and mobile technologies, and the night drop is getting worked out, too, these days. So, there’s definitely a quickening of that pace. And of course, boy, just a whole bunch of members are using our interactive teller technology now to service their everyday banking needs. And many were before, but it’s many times what it was before the “Stay Home, Stay Safe” order was issued.

09:50 LJ: Well, I also know that our call center team is just spot on with helping members, especially when there could be something that they can do without having to come into the office and trying to help them to bank a new way. When you look back on the past three months and moving forward, what do you think is the most … What are you most proud of, of your team? Because we are servant leaders, and to me, I’ve just been in awe of how we’re continuing to try to just make sure that member service is second to none.

10:29 JV: What a big question, Lynne. I couldn’t be prouder of this team. There is a word that we use mostly internally at the credit union, is grit, the ability to grind it out when times are hard. And boy, this team has done that, they have delivered for members. We have had folks working long hours and unusual ways to get the job done, but it’s our mission. And beyond even our mission as a company, it’s the mission of the people we hired. They’re servants. They love to serve others. They love to give and take care of people, and I’ve seen them execute on that every single day to the best of their abilities in less than the best of conditions, let’s face it. And they have done so well and I’m so proud of them, I’m so proud to call myself one of their teammates. And I just know this is gonna bring us even closer than we already were.

11:25 LJ: And I love the fact that we are all so excited to see each other again face-to-face, whether that means there’s six foot of space between us and a mask, it still is to be able to see those crinkling eyes smiling behind a huge factor in our culture. And I, for one, am so proud of that, and blessed to be a part of that. One other thought, Jeff, is to thank our members. This has been a different time, and there has been maybe some bumps that they’ve hit, but I’ll tell you what, I’ve never been more proud of people helping others while this is going on.

12:08 JV: Yeah, so many of our members have worked so hard to serve their communities, to take care of each other, to care of us. At times, boy, we appreciate their patience and others, when we couldn’t exactly deliver all the types of banking that we would have liked to deliver. We’re so blessed to have such a wonderful group of members, and that’s the spirit of credit unions. That’s the financial cooperative. We have over 100,000 members today that contribute to that. I’m proud to serve them and I know you are too, Lynne.

12:36 LJ: Absolutely. Well, Jeff, thank you so much for your time today. We really appreciate it.

12:40 JV: Thank you, Lynne.

12:41 LJ: Now, if anybody listening would like to look at our Back to Work Plan, give yourself ideas for your own business or your employer, that would be great. Just go to consumerscu.org and type in “back to work.” You’re gonna find out what our plan is that’s changing every day, [chuckle] and we appreciate you changing with us. We look forward to seeing you Monday, the 15th if you come into our offices. In other news, just send us information on any topics that you’d like us to focus on. Money, I’m Home. I’m Lynne Jarman-Johnson with Consumers Credit Union. Thank you, Jake Esselink for your production of this week’s broadcast. Have a great week.

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