CASESTUDY

Monitoring IT Service Processes After ITIL

Implementation at DAB Bank
In Germany and Austria, DAB Bank AG serves personal savings account holders, investors
and traders. DAB Bank offers a comprehensive spectrum of services for asset building,
securities and securing assets. In the area of corporate banking, the bank also partners
with trustees, fund brokers, financial planners as well as other financial institutions and
savings banks. When this Munich-based institute was founded in 1994, it started with
approximately 10,000 customers; today it manages 13 billion Euros for more than 462,000
accounts.
To increase its service quality, DAB Bank implemented a process structure based on ITIL
and achieved a noticeable improvement in quality after only 12 weeks.

Introduction of ITIL Processes

One of DAB Banks strengths in banking is
top quality at the lowest possible cost. The
IT department runs its IT service management (ITSM) according to the same
principle. With the ITIL-based iET ITSM
solution, the company achieved significant
quality improvements in its IT services only
12 weeks after its implementation.

Concept
The strategic decision to adopt ITIL came
from the IT departments initiative to optimize its processes by consolidating various
systems. The IT initiative prompted other
internal questions. Could the existing helpdesk software keep up with an overhaul of
the service organization? It quickly became
apparent that an adaptation of the existing
system was too cumbersome; an ITIL-compliant application had to be implemented.
According to Marcel Comans, Manager of
IT Service & Support, the selection of an
ITIL application was based on very clear
criteria, namely scalability, universal ITILbasis, minimal adaptation effort, and an
excellent price /performance ratio when
compared to other solutions. All these
aspects supported his choice of iET ITSM.
The same criteria were also applied to the
selection of the new IT service management system (ITSM). The tool had to
represent state of the art technology and
allow the employees in the IT department to
participate in the application development.

This would assure that any changes made

to the processes would be immediately
implemented in the ITSM application at the
helpdesk level. We have what I would call
a living process where we quickly and
easily make small adjustments to iET ITSM
on a weekly basis, said Comans describing
his experience. Since one of the most important goals focuses on the support of the
sales teams, a flexible and quick reaction is
imperative.
The plan had to be implemented as quickly
as possible. Once the decision was made
to make our IT service ITIL-compliant, we
wanted to quickly implement and apply the
changes, explained Marcel Comans, who
is in charge of incident management.
Consultants with experience in ITIL supported him in defining the processes.
Together, they conducted workshops for
internal customers of the banks various
departments as well as for its IT employees.
Based on these workshops, the project
group started designing the processes.

B EN E F I TS F O R D A B B A N K
u Ease of work through clear
processes
u

High user acceptance

Increased customer satisfaction

Higher efficiency through intranet

integration

Identification and benefit from synergies

Cutting-edge/up-to-date reports and

analysis

Flexibility for adaptations

In its ITIL orientation, DAB Bank was

looking for an even greater customer focus
in its services and processes. The main
concerns were:
u

Streamlining the IT-processes

Defining interfaces to other areas

Ability to measure the processes

Documenting all occurring errors

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DAB Bank

Defining service level agreements

Permanency of solutions to problems

Incident Management
All incidents ranging from requests to
replace a faulty keyboard to reporting a
major problem with the banking system are
recorded in the Incident Management
program, together with warnings or error
messages from the monitoring system. An
incident ticket is generated, classified and
prioritized into various service categories,
since not all incidents are equally important
and urgent. This system actively supports
the five employees at the helpdesk in this
task. Each error is categorized, and based
on its system category, can only receive
certain priorities, which in turn are
connected to the service levels.
Marcel Comans sees a clear advantage to
this. My colleagues at the helpdesk have it
much easier with iET ITSM, and in case of
an escalation, we can ensure that only the
relevant cases are being presented to
management.
Looking back, Marcel Comans is very
satisfied with the result. All members of the
process were involved right from the start,
which ensured the great acceptance that
we have today. Together with our customers, we defined recovery periods that are
documented in corresponding service levels
and which can be monitored with iET ITSM.
Our customers appreciate that they only
have to deal with a single point of contact.
It makes no difference whether an incident
is reported by telephone via the hotline,
over the Internet or by email. If a service
level agreement stipulates that the customer must be called back within 24 hours,
the employee will be reminded in time to do
so. With the introduction of ITSM, it is now
possible to send email messages and
escalations to the responsible employees
and management.
The Intranet interface with standardized
messages is another enhancement that is
greatly welcomed by internal customers
from various departments. Explaining the
systems success, Comans said, There

was a noticeable decrease in the number of

initial calls to the hotline. We are simply
faster with inquiries from the Internet. The
helpdesk team processes approximately
200 incidents per day.

We save a lot of time. I can

generate my reports faster. Plus,
my colleagues who may have
little experience with the database

Problem Management

structure, can put together reports

For the IT departments customers, getting

a solution to their problem is their first
priority. Yet problem management also
deals with the analysis and resolution of
related incidents, so several incidents can
be addressed at the same time. The
second-level support at DAB Bank, IT operations, is responsible for the operation of
the various systems, such as the trading
applications or the account management
system. The person in charge of the system
is the first point of contact if similar incidents
occur. He analyzes the incidents for repetitions and parallels. If he or a helpdesk
employee discovers a conspicuous accumulation of comparable incidents, then all
similar queries are combined into one
problem case.

with a few mouse clicks and are

less dependent on me.
Marcel Comans,
Manager of IT Service and
Support, DAB Bank

The person in charge of the product

develops and properly documents a
solution. This effort is valuable, since the
helpdesk employee can now access the
appropriate solution if such an incident
reoccurs.
Depending on the nature of the problem,
either instruction for resolving an incident
suffices or an extensive cause analysis is
required. In the latter case, the person in
charge of the product forms a team of
experts who deal with the problem
according to its urgency and importance.
The team leader makes sure a solution is
found and documented. In normal cases,
the solution is communicated to the
customer via helpdesk contact. However, if
the case is more complicated, the team
leader speaks directly with the customer.
That way we can ensure that our customers
are assisted quickly without breaks in
communication, explains Klaus Hintermayr,
head of problem management.

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DAB Bank

His team is also subject to specific guidelines in terms of restoration time.

Hintermayr continues, We can already say
today, so soon after its introduction, that
with iET ITSM the quality of our service has
improved. Our employees work together
through unified processes very efficiently.
Everyone recognizes the value of good
information from the other colleagues and
thus contributes as well.

Change Management
Frequently the solution to a problem
requires extensive changes to the systems.
In the IT production area, the third-level
support, called the IT systems infrastructure team, is concerned with change
management. Under the project management of Alexander Venzke, head of
IT systems infrastructure, the relevant
processes are set up according to ITIL.
In addition to IT production, a second area
called IT solutions is involved in the
processes each step along the way. Afterwards, approximately 20 employees will
use iET ITSM for their daily work. With this
approach DAB Bank builds up a system
that represents the banks individual service
processes as a whole and is used by all IT
areas throughout the company.

Key Performance Indicators

As head of IT operations, Klaus Hintermayr
is responsible for both quality and efficiency
in his area. Using iET ITSM, he generates
with the push of a button reports
about problem development, runtimes and
the duration of each problems cause
analysis. His colleague, Marcel Comans,
also easily generates reports since the
introduction of iET ITSM. The open
interface to the database allows him to
quickly answer questions with just a few
mouse clicks.
As a result, he can access queries on the
number of incidents of a given priority for a
certain application at any time. An
additional module to iET ITSM, the iET
Process Analyzer, combines classic
reporting with detailed analysis options for
root cause analysis at the process level.

For Marcel Comans, this tool offers a clear

advantage over the previous data views
through spreadsheet calculations. With
iET Process Analyzer, I always have
graphic reports ready. I can save template
reports under the favorites option, and, if
necessary, can adapt them easily by dragand-drop in just a few clicks.
He is particularly interested in the generation of quality key data. Questions
regarding the initial solution rate and how
many cases were closed with 2nd-level or
3rd-level support are helpful indicators.
Furthermore, an important question is to
what extent service levels are upheld or
breached. The iET Process Analyzer
already contains standard reports for this,
comparing nominal times with actual times.

ABOUT DAB BANK

In Germany and Austria, DAB Bank AG serves
personal savings account holders, investors and
traders. The largest direct broker measured by
its customers security assets offers a
comprehensive spectrum of services for asset
building, securities and securing assets. In the
area of corporate banking, the bank also partners
with trustees, fund brokers, financial planners, as
well as other financial institutions and savings
banks. When this Munich-based institute was
founded in 1994, it started with approximately
10,000 customers; today it manages 13 billion
Euros for more than 462,000 accounts.
www.dab.com

The evaluation options that are part of the

standard package already cover 95% of our
requirements, explains Comans with
satisfaction. We complement them with just
a few key pieces of data that shed light on
the results of our escalation process.
For measuring quality in problem management key data, such as the mean time until
a problem is solved or the number of incidents in connection with a certain problem,
is particularly helpful. Each process step
can be combined and displayed with cost
rates or prices. A great advantage is the
direct connection to the data in iET ITSM,
making cumbersome customizing, mapping
or comparison processes obsolete.
In addition, its ease of use was one of the
reasons DAB Bank decided to install
iET Process Analyzer. We save a lot of
time. I can generate my reports faster. Plus,
my colleagues who may have little experience with the database structure, can put
together reports with a few mouse clicks
and are less dependent on me, explains
Comans smiling.

Root Cause Analysis

In cases where the cause of a problem
requires more research, the iET Process
Analyzer shows its full strength. Typically
the analysis process begins with the time
dimension.

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CASESTUDY

DAB Bank

The key performance indicators from

incident management are first queried adhoc and reviewed over a certain period of
time, possibly even compared with other
time intervals. Here the program shows, for
example, how many calls per month have
been taken by how many employees or
what was the throughput time over the last
six or 12 months. If runaways can be
identified, the detailed work begins.
If Comans, Hintermayr and their colleagues
observe an obvious discrepancy, they can
immediately drill down to get to the bottom
of it. By double-clicking on an icon, they can
investigate the issue by reviewing a list of
effected processes. Finding the cause for a
special case has just become easier. One
glance at the attributes highlights the
associated process values.

The extensive work has paid off for DAB

Bank. What ITIL promised has actually
been delivered, Comans notes. His
colleagues now can focus freely on their
daily work and concentrate more on
preparing optimal solutions.
At DAB Bank, it is obvious that the
IT systems strongly support the banks
strategies. With leading applications and
new processes, the bank is well prepared
and the bankers see further growth coming
their way.

Ideal Foundation for

Decision and Planning
A retrospective analysis of the problems
and their causes is extremely important;
defining the right measures for the future is
the next critical step. Graphic evaluations
help make the optimization potential visible.
They illustrate where the efficiency of a
process can be increased, and an integrated cost analysis helps draw the right
conclusions from past values. For instance,
the runaways that cause the highest costs
will be dealt with first. In addition, the evaluations also represent a good planning
instrument. The multi-dimensional analysis
of past values, for example, helps estimate
the resources for the future.
Furthermore, Marcel Comans wants
iET Process Analyzer to be used increasingly for monitoring running processes.
We no longer have to wait until a multitude
of incidents or escalations catch our
attention. Each IT team leader who keeps a
regular watch on iET Process Analyzer can
see whether problems seem to be
accumulating in his department. That way
he can respond at an early stage.

A B O U T i ET SOLU T I O NS
iET Solutions, a division of UNICOM Global, is a
leading global supplier of service management
and software asset management solutions. With
the help of a flexible set of software suites,
iET Solutions allows its customers to fulfill compliance requirements, mitigate audit risks and realize business value by managing, automating
and continually improving their services.
Our IT service management solution, iET ITSM,
is fully built around ITIL best practices.
iETSolutions has been awarded with certifications from the OGC, now part of the Cabinet
Office, the APM Group, the glenfisPassed and
the PinkVERIFY 3.1 certification for 12 ITIL
processes. Add-on-software is available to
manage the IT infrastructure (CMS/CMDB),
licenses and entitlements as well as for process
analysis and optimization.
More than 600 companies in 26 countries benefit
from the iET Solutions software offerings.

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