CU*Answers, a 100% credit union-owned cooperative CUSO, recently concluded a project to double the amount of historical end-of-month data stored on its production servers. The CUSO began the process of expanding the standard retention of these files in March 2017, along with a similar project to progressively double the retention and availability of member transaction histories across all account types.

As of June 2017, each of the 160+ online credit unions on the CU*BASE® core processing system now have six full months of EOM data snapshots, increased from three months, to support their research and reporting efforts. This expansion of file retention is at no cost to credit unions, and represents another example of the CUSO’s commitment to support its credit union owners with the tools and data to manage business intelligence and develop data strategies around their core processor.

CU*Answers’ newly-formed Asterisk Intelligence team is taking the lead on these data expansion projects and expects to announce several more throughout 2017. Keegan Daniel manages the Asterisk Intelligence team and commented: “The extension of file and transaction history retention is our proactive step toward supporting credit unions who want the ability to see and act upon more of their data. The prior standard of data retention at CU*Answers was functional, but we want to be more than functional. These projects, and more like them, build a solid framework for the broader goal of supporting data analytics, business intelligence, and database management initiatives at each of our credit union partners.”

The separate project to double retention of transaction histories is projected to hit its goal in March 2018 with twelve months available history on savings and checking accounts, increased from six months. By this point other account types such as certificates, loans, and IRAs will also have increased to thirty-six months available history, and will continue to expand until they hit a new cap of forty-eight months. Previously at a limit of twenty-four months availability, these accounts’ standard transaction history is also doubling, at no cost to credit union-owners of CU*Answers.

For any questions regarding Asterisk Intelligence or data analytics and data warehousing at CU*Answers, please contact Keegan Daniel, vice president of Professional Services, or visit the Asterisk Intelligence web page.