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Advancial's Second Location in Lafayette Opens its Doors
LAFAYETTE— Advancial Federal Credit Union opened its second location in Lafayette, Louisiana on October 22. Located on Johnston Street, near The Mall of Acadiana, the newest location will serve members living or working in the southern portion of Lafayette.
"A large number of Advancial's staff have contributed their thought and time in making our newest location in Lafayette another place where members are happy to conduct banking," said Brent Sheffield, President and CEO of Advancial. "Our newest location has all the amenities of our original location but with some upgrades to provide convenience to members."
While banking at the new South Lafayette branch, members can enjoy a coffee bar, iPads to keep kids entertained and privacy rooms for loan application discussions. Upon entering the branch members are welcomed with a hallway of multi-changing bubbles to provide a high tech feel in an otherwise old world styled building. Multi-changing lights, jumbo sized televisions and automated systems contrast with black wrought iron detailing, real barn house doors and exposed wooden beams. These features and décor elements deliver Advancial's value of innovation while keeping with the local architectural style.
"We're very excited to be welcoming members to this new location," said Jackie Armentor, Branch Manager of Advancial's South Lafayette branch. "Along with the obvious upgrades we have in the lobby there are many perks we've included in the break room to give staff a feeling of home while they're at work."
The break room features full tele- and video conference capabilities, spacious seating and high-end kitchen appliances. Staff also benefit from integrated automated systems for money handling and drive-thru service that deliver faster queuing for members. Plans are underway to promote the new branch with a Lafayette-wide campaign. Local residents can participate in an interactive "tag, you're it" themed game for chances to win cash. Details are to come this month.
With a history dating back to 1937, Advancial provides a diversified line of advanced financial solutions to its members. Today, Advancial is a full-service financial institution that serves more than 75,000 members worldwide and has assets of over $1 billion. For more information on this organization, please visit www.advancial.org.
Advancial Celebrates 75th Anniversary with a Grand Slam
DALLAS— Advancial Federal Credit Union has provided quality service to members for 75 years and in celebration of the Diamond Anniversary Advancial coordinated both member and employee baseball-themed contests that occurred throughout the month of August.
"Advancial is proud of our long history, and was excited to highlight 75 years with these events. Both employees and members have been critical to our successes over the years, and it was important that everyone be included in the celebration." said Brent Sheffield, President and CEO of Advancial. "It adds a competitive element to the fun and pride that goes into the milestone that we've reached."
The 75th Anniversary promotion for members ended with a drawing for a 75" television. Members were encouraged to sign up for online services in order to receive entry drawings. Online services highlighted include online banking, eStatements, bill payer and iDeposit, Advancial's remote deposit product. As a result of the online services push, individual services increased by 832. iDeposit was the leader in new users with 325. At promotion-end there was also a total increase of 447 users that signed up for all four online services. With the technical advancements Advancial has made to improve these online services, the benefit to sign up is clear to members. Members also visited their local branch for a chance to win fun prizes in a baseball-themed member appreciation event.
For Advancial's internal celebration, each week Advancial staff participated in activities that awarded them drawing entries for a separate, internal prize. These activities included coordinating clever baseball-themed photos, completing trivia about Advancial's history and, lastly, trading baseball cards customized for each employee of Advancial. To add to the fun atmosphere, employees were allowed to wear Advancial branded baseball shirts and hats to work weekly. The lucky employee to win the grand prize giveaway received a television and baseball watching party.
With a history dating back to 1937, Advancial provides a diversified line of advanced financial solutions to its members. Today, Advancial is a full-service financial institution that serves more than 75,000 members worldwide and has assets over $1 billion. For more information on this organization, please visit the Advancial website at www.advancial.org.
Advancial Releases iPhone App
DALLAS— Advancial Federal Credit Union has released their first wave in mobile apps. The Advancial App for iPhone was released June 11, 2012. The first day of release, the app was downloaded through the iTunes App Store onto 1,617 devices. Currently, there have been 3,774 downloads for iPhones.
"We are happy to be able to offer our members the ease and convenience of the ultimate mobile banking experience through the Advancial App," said Larry Burwell, Chief Information Officer with Advancial. "It has been well received by users, and we look forward to expanding the services offered to members."
The Advancial App is a step above the basic financial institution app with many differentiating factors, including iDeposit, which allows members to make a remote deposit by uploading an image of a check. Users will also be able to view past iDeposit history and update contact information directly from their device.
Advancial plans to release an app for the iPad and all Android devices in the coming weeks, which will also host the great features available on the Advancial App for iPhone.
With a history dating back to 1937, Advancial provides a diversified line of advanced financial solutions to its members. Today, Advancial is a full-service financial institution that serves more than 73,000 members worldwide and has assets over $1 billion.
Advancial Awards Three Savvy Saver Dinero Teens Scholarships
DALLAS— Advancial Federal Credit Union continued the initiative to support education by awarding scholarships in the amounts of $3,000, $2,000 and $1,000 to three Dinero Teens members. Dinero Teens is a financial services program designed for Advancial members aged 13 to 18.
"This year's applicants were especially creative" said Brent Sheffield, President and CEO of Advancial. "We were thoroughly impressed by the unique ways that the students chose to showcase their financial planning knowledge."
This year's task for Dinero Teens was to create a thorough, organized and creative budget presentation for their college expenses. Many times high school teens underestimate the cost of tuition, books, room and board and the many other costs incurred during college years. This scholarship activity is meant to encourage junior high and senior aged high school teens to create a presentation detailing those costs. In order to involve employees in the selection process we opened voting company-wide to determine the top three winners. Applicants were judged on academic achievement and the content, organization, clarity and creativity of the budget project submitted.
The first place winner received a $3,000 scholarship for a creative song about budgeting. The song was a parody of the song Viva la Viva by Coldplay and was transformed by the winning contestant into Viva la Budget. A professional and well thought PowerPoint presentation earned a Dinero Teen member from Heath, Texas the spot as Advancial's second place winner. She outlined costs for housing, tuition and other expenses she will face in secondary schooling and the steps she will take to bridge the gap. Advancial's first ever blog entry earned the third place recognition and a total of $1,000 for the Dinero Teen winner. This creative Dinero Teen included daily entries in the blog about such topics as the cost of a new bicycle lock to researching a new cell phone plan on billshrink.com.
Advancial supports financial education through programs such as Dinero Teens. The Dinero Teens program gives members access to a range of financial products and services including savings accounts, low minimum starter certificates, checking accounts and credit cards. Members can also enjoy several perks, such as a quarterly newsletter and the annual scholarship contest.
With a history dating back to 1937, Advancial provides a diversified line of advanced financial solutions to its members. Today, Advancial is a full-service financial institution that serves more than 73,000 members worldwide and has assets of over $1 billion.
Advancial is EMMAs Shortlisted Nominee for 2012
HOUSTON— Advancial Federal Credit Union has been recognized as a shortlisted nominee for The Forum for Expatriate Management's EMMA (Expatriate Management and Mobility Awards). Advancial's category in the America's division is the "International Benefits Provider of the Year (Large)" and consists of other benefits providers such as MetLife and Aetna International.
"We're very pleased to be recognized for this honor," says Lauren Stockard, Advancial's Business Relations Manager of the Houston area. "Advancial is well-deserving of this award because of the wide range of products and services we offer to expatriates that other financial institutions do not offer."
The Forum for Expatriate Management received over 500 entries for the 2012 EMMA awards (Americas division). Requirements to enter into the EMMAs included a 150 word summary as to why the company deserves the award, a one to two page supporting statement and testimonials from clients. With over 24 categories of awards ranging from "Best Family Support Program" to "Most Effective Relocation Management Strategy" the exclusive group of shortlisted companies is a collection of those striving to offer the best products and services to a unique group of employees. Finalists will be announced on September 13, 2012 at the Global Mobility Summit in Las Vegas.
One of the largest obstacles for expatriates is getting financially settled in the United States. Advancial understands this difficulty and attempts to make the financial transition easy for expatriates moving into the U.S. Over the past two years, Advancial has marketed an expatriate program that consists of many unique product offerings for this audience. While other institutions will help with bank accounts, they are not able to offer financial education or high unsecured limits on loans. Advancial is able to offer expatriates credit card limits up to $10,000, auto loans up to $50,000 and multi-million dollar mortgages, upon arrival to the U.S.
"We are always highly impressed with [Advancial's] service and the financial products that they are able to offer," said Sharon Pfeffer, Vice President Sales of HomeCorp Relocation & Real Estate Services. "Most financial institutions will not lend to the expatriate population, since they do not have a credit history. Advancial always surprises us with the amounts of loans that they will extend to expats."
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Fraud Alert – Secret Shopper Scam
Advancial has been notified by the CFPB and NCUA of a scam targeting people with fraudulent cashier's checks purporting to be from Advancial. Individuals receive these checks by mail and they're presented as a part of a "secret shopper" progr…
The Advancial Lafayette Oak is "Live" and Well
In honor of National Love a Tree Day we are sharing our Lafayette live oak survivor story.
Back-to-School Money Management Tips
The pressure's on for buying school supplies for kids, teens and college students heading back to school. According to a National Retail Federation report, families sending children back to school and young adults off to college plan to spend record amounts of money on school and college supplies this fall.1
Did you know it's Fraud Education Awareness Week?
As the holidays approach we want to remind you that fraudsters do not take holidays off. The holidays are even more reason to be aware of fraud tactics and scams.