The spread of the coronavirus in the United States has created a sense of urgency among many credit unions to review, update, or even create pandemic plans and policies. As the virus continues to spread globally, credit unions simply can’t wait to take action.
Callahan Associates hosted a virtual event featuring a panel of credit union leaders across the US. Panel participants shared their plans and perspectives on the matter at hand including, but not limited to, personnel management, travel, disaster recovery, branch services, member impact and more.
During this discussion, panel participants addressed the following questions:
Operations
- How you are organized to respond to situations like this Do you have an emergency response team in place? What roles are part of it?
- What has been your timeline for activating your pandemic response plans?
- What actions have you already taken?
- How are you monitoring the situation? How are you using that information to determine whether or when the credit union will make changes to/escalate plans?
- Have you made any operational changes at branches? Do you have triggers in place to determine if/when you might reduce branch hours or close them? What messaging strategy is planned if that occurs?
Employees
- What steps have you implemented so far as it relates to employees?
- How, and how frequently, are you communicating with employees?
- What questions are you getting from your employees? What has been the impacts you’ve seen so far on your employees?
- If you were to close your branch network, what are your plans for the front-line staff?
- What are your plans if an employee is in contact with someone who contracts COVID-19 or tests positive?
Members
- What messages are you communicating to members, and through what channels? Are you encouraging or reinforcing online/mobile/call center transaction capabilities?
- Are you planning or have you already implemented any product changes, such as deferred payments for people out of work?
- What questions are you getting from your members?
Before we go:
- What would be the one thing you would urge other credit unions to do right now about the coronavirus outbreak?
- Are there any other lessons you have learned so far that you would like to pass along?
