Bank takes customer service to a higher level
October 2015
By Melissa George Bowman
Photography by Robert Fouts
In the lobby of Sterling Bank a large frame displaying a customer covenant greets customers. It reminds them bank employees “take 100 percent responsibility for meeting the needs of each customer” – a promise Sterling Bank President and CEO W. Alan Worrell and his team do not take lightly.
“We’re more service-oriented than what you would typically see in a bank,” Worrell said. “All banks talk about being relationship-oriented, but we truly live that every day. We are truly relationship-oriented and have been from the very beginning.”
Sterling Bank has been in business 26 years and from the start was designed to offer a higher level of service. Worrell has been with the organization since day one. He previously worked for Jim Wilson & Associates and was encouraged by the late Jim Wilson Jr. to start the new company. At the time, Wilson served on the board of a Birmingham-based bank holding company and was impressed with its commitment to exceptional customer service. He felt a similarly run bank would do well in Montgomery. Wilson and Worrell worked together to form Sterling Bank and by March of 1989 its doors were open.
In 1992, Sterling Bank and its holding company, First Commercial Bank Shares, merged into Synovus Bank, a company dating back to 1888. Today Synovus operates banks in Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina and Tennessee. While each community bank has a different name, all are part of the Synovus family. Locally, Sterling Bank has three Montgomery locations and one in Prattville.
Not only does Sterling Bank provide traditional banking services for individuals and businesses big and small, it also offers a wide variety of investment, insurance and residential mortgage financing services.
Whatever service a customer needs, Worrell says the bank takes time to know each person by name. Sterling Bank has unique ways to accomplish this, including its office design. You will not see typical teller windows found in most bank lobbies at Sterling Bank. Instead, bankers seated at desks welcome customers. Referred to as personal bankers, Worrell says they can assist a wide variety of customer needs.
“Every customer gets a relationship manager assigned to them so they know who their banker is, and we make sure we build on that relationship,” Worrell said. “We also make it a point to make sure they know more than just that person. We want them to know our whole banking team, and we use a team approach as much as we can.”
As an example, Worrell said that a mortgage representative would assist a customer looking to buy a home. Similarly, a financial consultant would be referred to someone wanting to open a retirement account or a trust officer would be assigned to someone interested in will or estate planning.
Whatever the need may be, Worrell said response time is key.
“We want to be responsive. We don’t want to make customers wait,” he said. “For example, if we get an RFP (request for proposal) and they’re submitting it to multiple banks, we’re told so often that we’re the first one to respond.”
That kind of attention to customer needs has always been part of the Sterling Bank philosophy. When the bank opened in 1989, Worrell says they were the first in Montgomery to stay open through lunch and until 5 p.m. At that time most banks closed during lunch and at 4 p.m.
Just as Sterling Bank was innovative then, it has also adapted to modern technology. Today many customers want immediate access. Sterling Bank accommodates those needs through online and mobile banking options, drive-thru services and expanded call center hours. However, Worrell is quick to point out Sterling Bank will always offer a personal connection to those who want it.
“There are still plenty of people who want to know who their banker is and who want to be able to pick up the phone and call their banker and have a higher level of service than you’re going to be able to get just using technology channels,” he said. “You’ve got to serve both.”
In the same way that accommodating customers is a priority for Sterling Bank, taking care of employees is important, too.
“We’re very pro-family in our business activities. We encourage people to go to their children’s school activities – don’t miss plays; don’t miss sporting events,” he said. “We try to promote camaraderie – that teamwork and that family environment within our bank so that people like coming to work.”
Part of that teamwork includes giving back to the community. Sterling Bank and its employees invest time and resources in community activities and service projects. According to Worrell, a recipient of Synovus’ William B. Turner Humanitarian Award for community service, the bank tries to be “involved in every good thing that’s going on.”
For 26 years Sterling Bank has worked to provide the best service possible to its customers, its employees and the community, and according to Worrell, the bank intends to keep doing so for many more years to come.
“We’re running our company for the long term. We’re not in this to be bought out or to merge in with a bigger organization,” he said. “We’re in it and the decisions we make and the way in which we run our bank and our company is for the long term.”
