Community Affairs Produces Two New Publications

The St. Louis Fed's Community Affairs Department has released its latest installment of "Perspectives on Credit Scoring and Fair Mortgage Lending." This brochure--the fourth of a five-part series--explores staff training and data accuracy. The first four installments, together with an introduction and folder for the series of credit scoring articles, are available now. The remaining installment, "Overrides and Second Review Process," is under development and should be distributed within the next few months.

Coming up with the money for affordable housing, job training, downtown revitalization and other community development projects is hard. To make it easier, our Community Affairs Department has produced a self-study guide, "Community Development Financing: Coming Up With the Money." The guide is designed for employees at banks, nonprofits and government agencies who are new to community development.

To order hard copies of these publications, contact Linda Aubuchon at (314) 444-8646 or toll-free at 1-800-333-0810, ext. 44-8646. You may also access the credit-scoring brochures on line at www.stls.frb.org/caffairs/index.html.

Fed Introduces Two Accounting and Billing Applications

This spring, financial institutions will be able to access two web-based accounting applications nationwide. They are Account Management Information and Service Charge Information.

The Account Management Information system will allow customers to have real-time access to their accounting activity and let them "drill down" from summary totals to detail-level transactions. The Service Charge Information application--formerly referred to as Data Access System for Billing--will provide customers with online access to their monthly billing statement and allow them to download billing data for their internal use.

Prior to application rollout, customers will receive product information and a self-guided, computer-based training CD. Information sessions also will be offered to District customers following implementation. For more information on these two applications, contact Ranada Williams at (314) 444-8343 or 1-800-333-0869, ext. 44-8343.