Bank of China Branch Cuts Paper 95%

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Bank of China’s London operations have reduced paper consumption by 95 percent with help from IBM, the companies have announced.

IBM Business Partner Centric iSolutions is helping the Bank’s London subsidiary to automate the processing of its interbank messages.

The bank had been manually printing about 3,000 interbank messages a day, and distributing these to various internal departments. This method had high labor costs, used 50 pounds of paper a day and presented an avoidable operational risk, IBM said.

IBM instituted an electronic routing and monitoring system, eliminating the need to print out hard copies, and saving £12,000 a year on paper costs alone.

All employees in the loan, trading services, banking, clearing and IT departments have access to an online transactions application, as needed depending on their role. The system is powered by IBM Informix software. It has a powerful search engine that allows the bank to ensure transactions are processed in the proper time frame, IBM said.

"The improved access to information has been key in helping us meet compliance regulations and reduce costs. The availability of information across all our departments has led to further benefits such as reducing our paper consumption by 95 percent and allowed us to make more timely and accurate decisions," said Stephen Hinds, COO of Bank of China's London branch and subsidiary.

A recent survey found that IBM stood out, along with Deloitte and Logica, as the most capable companies in sustainable technology services.

Recently IBM has been highly ranked in a number of sustainability rankings. It was number three in Newsweek’s environmental rankings of the 500 largest U.S. companies. As of November 17 it was a top holding in the Dow Jones Sustainability World (DJSIWorld) Enlarged Index.

IBM came in only seventh on Greenpeace’s Cool IT leaderboard, but the survey ranked IBM number one in the category of company efforts to reduce their own emissions.

Image: Joel Penner via Flickr.

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