December 30, 2022

Banks want to attract and retain talent but cannot compete based on remuneration alone to motivate staff. They must create a cohesive team, a likable workplace culture, and a productive learning environment to support their employees’ professional and financial development. Creating a cohesive environment that facilitates learning and development will be a top trend in the banking industry in 2023.

Assessment of non-sufficient funds fees (NSF) on representments of items, such as Automated Clearing House (ACH) withdrawals and checks, have been a heightened risk issue for financial institutions. While this is not a new issue because checks have been represented for decades, the volume of electronic transactions over that same period has drastically increased.

The UBA Fall Compliance Conference took over the Doubletree Hotel in Park City for three cold and snowy days, Oct. 25-27, 2022. Over the course of the conference, attendees heard from several compliance and subject experts, including multiple sessions with David Dickinson from Banker’s Compliance Consulting, Julia Gutierrez from Compliance Alliance, Monika McCarthy from CrossCheck Compliance, and Stephanie Lyon from Ncontracts.

In an American Banker op-ed earlier this year, I called out the CFPB under the leadership of Rohit Chopra as a “regulator gone rogue.” I’m not alone in my criticism: in September,
12 Republican lawmakers took the bureau to task over what they called a “radical and highly-politicized agenda unbounded by statutory limits.”

Many people today have become so invested in political narratives that the reality right in front of them can become blurred. In some cases, the inability to focus on what is real is driven by innocent confusion. In others, it is the result of a conscious intent to deceive. Either way, when our policies are driven by narrative instead of reality, we inevitably experience pain.