Case Study
ING DIRECT USA Modernizes Planning and Forecasting with Oracle Hyperion
ING DIRECT USA is the nation’s leading savings bank and is wholly owned by ING Group. The company serves millions of customers in the United States through online, phone, and mail-based banking, with a business model built around convenient access and operational efficiency. As the organization continued to grow, it needed a more effective way to support budgeting, planning, and forecasting across a large consumer banking operation.
To improve both efficiency and planning capability, ING DIRECT USA replaced its former planning tool, SRC, with a new Oracle Hyperion 11.1.2 Planning application. MindStream Analytics implemented the solution to help modernize finance processes, reduce manual effort, and create a more scalable framework for forecasting and expense planning.
The Challenge:
Before the Hyperion implementation, ING DIRECT USA relied on SRC, PeopleSoft, ODW, and Excel spreadsheets to support reporting and planning. Because there was no centralized repository for financial data, the process was highly manual and required analysts to download information from multiple systems, manipulate data, and perform calculations each month. This created inefficiencies and made the process difficult to scale.
The lack of standardization created additional challenges. Calculated data was not always consistent across different functional areas, reports were not standardized among finance teams, and information did not sync back to source systems in a streamlined way. Analysts also lacked an easy way to compare actual statistics to budget statistics, which limited visibility and slowed decision-making.
Forecasting itself was also delayed by the manual close-related workflow. The Financial Planning and Analysis team had to wait for Accounting to close the period and for data loading activities to be completed before forecasting could begin. The monthly process involved copying prior forecasts forward, making pre-close detailed adjustments, then following with post-close high-level adjustments. Expense forecasts depended on separate files, business drivers, and manual rate adjustments, making the process time-consuming and prone to human error.
The Solution
MindStream Analytics implemented an Oracle Hyperion Planning 11.1.2 solution designed to improve expense planning within ING DIRECT USA’s existing business process while also laying the groundwork for a more scalable forecasting model. The new application replaced the former planning tool and introduced a more structured environment for planning, reporting, and analysis.
The ING DIRECT USA Planning application was divided into four plan types. These included a primary Income Statement plan type along with supporting Balance Sheet, Volume forecasting, and Workforce planning models. The secondary plan types flowed into the primary plan, creating a more connected planning process across key financial areas.
The solution also included Workforce Planning and FDQM, enabling analysts to drill down into PeopleSoft general ledger data and work from a more integrated environment. Financial and employee-related expenses were collected from PeopleSoft, operating and loan data was drawn from ODW, and volume forecast drivers were supplied through flat files. Those drivers were then applied to rates that produced the first pass of the expense plan, after which analysts could adjust rates or resulting expenses to refine the planning outcome. The same approach supported outer-year planning as well.
Key solution components included:
The Result
The Oracle Hyperion Planning solution gave ING DIRECT USA a more centralized and structured planning environment. By replacing fragmented tools and spreadsheet-heavy processes with a connected application, the organization reduced manual effort and improved the consistency of data used across budgeting, planning, and forecasting.
Standardized plan types and improved data access helped create a stronger financial planning foundation for analysts and finance teams. With a more organized process for loading data, applying drivers, and adjusting forecasts, the business was better positioned to condense planning cycles and support more reliable expense forecasting.
Overall, the new environment improved scalability, reduced operational friction in the monthly forecast process, and created a stronger platform for ongoing financial analysis. Instead of depending on disconnected files and repetitive manual work, ING DIRECT USA gained a more dependable planning application aligned with the needs of a large and growing financial institution.