When Wes Thompson, INB Peoria relationship banker, received a phone call from a local customer requesting a large amount of money, he didn’t hesitate to go straight to branch manager Pam Cain.
“Wes saw some red flags, and I was concerned because I knew what the customer was requesting was not his normal behavior,” Pam recalls. “We also spoke with our compliance team about the situation.”
Eventually, Wes asked the customer to come in to help resolve what ended up being a fraud scheme.
Pam commends Wes for asking thoughtful questions and helping the customer feel at ease rather than at fault. “This was a case of Wes working smart; he listened to our customer and took action right away,” she says.
Thinking Through to the Right Solution
“Working smart” is one of INB’s core values, each of which lay the foundation for a culture that encourages collaboration, facilitates innovation and guides our strategic priorities. Our other core values include Caring, Teamwork, Assertive and Enthusiastic, Creative, and Balance.
When it comes to working smart, our team looks at each day as an opportunity to learn and be independent in our thinking.
This was certainly the case for Wes, whose quick thinking saved his customer from being a victim of fraud and potentially losing a large amount of money.
“Our customer was very upset and nervous, and it was a pretty emotional time for all of us, but he was so thankful that we recognized the scam and stopped him. Just being there for him and his wife through this scary time was so important and something they will never forget,” Pam shares.
Working Smart to Help a Remittance Customer
Audra Von de Bur, INB’s Remittance Services Supervisor, also commends a fellow staff member for “working smart.” INB was approached by a local organization with boxes of records dating back to the 1980s. They contracted INB to scan those documents, make searchable PDFs, and then shred the physical copies.
“These documents had been in a closet, had been wet at one point and were on old pin feed paper, which was old, smelly and brittle,” Audra shares. “Our Lockbox crew, along with Dale Kroening, now a Federal Mail Processor, spent many days tearing each page and keeping it in order in each box so that it could be scanned in the computer room.”
Tackling more than 40 boxes with at least 5,000 sheets in each box, Dale scanned all of the boxes by himself over the course a couple of weeks – even though he’d recently taken a new position at INB and was completing this project in addition to learning his new duties!
“He was meticulous in keeping all of the pages and boxes in order,” Audra says. “Dale is an excellent operator; he is thorough and takes great pride in doing a great job.”
Working smart certainly filters into other values like teamwork and being assertive, and our team at INB strives to live out each of these values through all of our actions and decisions.
“It is so important to work together as a team, listen and keep each other informed,” Pam says. “We work really hard to do that across all staff and departments.”