DST Unveils Universal e-Statement Solution
Mutual Funds and VAs Can Save Money, and Advisors Can Increase Efficiency With Electronic Statements Through DST Vision
KANSAS CITY, Mo., Nov. 17 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Mutual fund and variable annuity companies can now suppress paper statements to advisors and provide an enhanced electronic statement solution through DST Vision®. Vision is the industry-leading account management Web site for financial intermediaries.
With Vision's universal e-statements solution, management companies can eliminate the expensive process of printing and mailing copies of shareholder statements to the advisors that sell their funds. Advisors, in turn, can maintain comprehensive, easy-to-access customer records by downloading a single electronic file of all their shareholder statements and saving it to various storage media.
Universal Solution
To ensure broad-based adoption, the Vision e-statement solution is available to all mutual fund and variable annuity companies. In addition, Vision's solution can be implemented with any statement vendor or proprietary solution. Broker/dealers may opt to integrate a stand-alone statement retrieval engine within their proprietary advisor desktop.
"Advisors want access to all of their customer statements through a simple book-of-business level retrieval process," said Kyle Mallot, DST Systems, Inc. client service officer in charge of Vision. "They also want this access through a centralized source, making Vision a natural solution."
Industry Demand
The ICI Broker-Dealer Advisory Committee (BDAC) task force on paper suppression has been meeting with management companies and the broker/dealer community for some time to promote paper suppression and address industry concerns. For example, when "turning off" paper statements, fund companies want to know that they can replicate the service of providing documentation, now in an electronic environment. Advisors want a streamlined method to access and store client statements. Vision has emerged as the preferred channel for delivering e-statements to advisors.
"DST has worked to understand the various issues surrounding paper suppression and to make sure the Vision solution meets the needs of fund companies and advisors," said Dennis Macksoud, vice president and relationship manager, MFS, and a member of the paper suppression task force. "MFS looks forward to supporting its distribution partners through the Vision solution."
Introduced in 1998, DST Vision(R) is designed to provide independent advisors an easy-to-use, one-stop information source for customer positions held directly with fund families and variable annuity providers. With a single ID and password, advisors have access to account management tools including transaction processing capabilities, customizable client portfolios, and electronic statements. More than 70 percent of third-party-distributed mutual funds, including 17 of the 20 top-selling mutual funds, and over half of the leading variable annuity providers participate in Vision(R). Participating companies, representing more than 110 million accounts, include industry giants AllianceBernstein, AIM Investments, American Funds, MFS Investment Management, Nationwide Financial, OppenheimerFunds, Inc., and Pacific Life. Vision is continually enhanced to simplify account management and serve the evolving needs of financial intermediaries. Introduced in late 2004, Vision HomeOffice is designed to streamline daily operations and address compliance challenges for broker/dealer and trust company home-offices. Visit Vision at www.dstvision.com.
DST Systems, Inc. (NYSE:DST) provides sophisticated information processing and computer software services and products that help clients improve productivity, increase efficiencies, and provide higher levels of customer service. DST is organized domestically and internationally into two operating segments: Financial Services and Output Solutions. DST operates one of the most advanced data centers in the world, which provides information- processing services to support the products within each operating segment. These products are further enhanced through the integration of DST's advanced technology and e-commerce solutions.
Source: DST Systems, Inc.
CONTACT: Jill Metzler, Media Relations of DST Systems, Inc.,
+1-816-843-9087
Web site: www.dstvision.com/
