Barclays

Barclays use 4D application to radically improve company directory management.

 

The Challenge

New system needed to lower costs and produce more accurate office directories.

Barclays Bank publishes directories of important information about every office, branch and employee. Their old pre-1995 system was inefficient and error-prone. It required manual typesetting using collated paper information. There was an urgent need to upgrade to an automated and user-friendly package.

After scouring the market, Barclays chose CatBase, a powerful database publishing solution built with 4D. It’s an ideal system for publishing catalogues, office directories, price lists, membership registers and classified ads.

The Solution

4D database publishing application chosen to manage directory production.

Barclays now uses CatBase to update its directories on a daily basis. The application runs on a Windows NT server with Windows workstations. More sophisticated options are now possible, including a comprehensive range of indexes and searching. In 1999 full intranet access to data was enabled using 4D. This means that customers can be given up to date information quickly – for example, the name of a person able to deal with a business need. It also means that data compilation costs are reduced because staff can now update their own details and those of their branches online.

At the end of every day sets of files are automatically generated from the intranet database and emailed to the Directories Manager. These files are imported into temporary tables in the CatBase database, where they are reviewed before being applied to the live database.

The system is still used to publish two hard copy directories each year. This is now a very simple process as CatBase exports the information directly into their chosen publishing system, FrameMaker.

The Reward

A faster, more efficient system that keeps vital company information accessible and up to date.

The 4D system has made important information much more readily available to staff and customers. The Barclays Directories Manager comments: “The CatBase application is used to support Barclays’ key customer service tool and helps to answer thousands of customer calls every day. As we have to produce yearly printed directories the extraction of data from CatBase works very well and minor system changes to meet our needs have been possible at short notice.”

Fewer staff are now needed to compile and input data from the wide range of geographical sources so costs are significantly lower.

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