Creating and Maintaining Partnerships Through Successful Implementations

Our partnerships are built on trust, allowing institutions to be confident that Nelnet Campus Commerce solutions will be productive and secure when implemented. We spoke with the bursars at two different institution that have been partners with us for at least four years now and have implemented multiple Nelnet solutions over time. They provided great insight on what institutions should consider when deciding to partner with a third-party company.  

Cynthia Springman, bursar at Lycoming College, said her institution has partnered with Nelnet Campus Commerce since the summer of 2009. The partnership between Lycoming College and us started when they began to look for an online solution for paper checks and manual posting. Cynthia said that the institution started with implementing one of the Nelnet Campus Commerce solutions, QuikPay. Four years later, they were introduced to another solution, Enterprise, and went through another successful implementation. This new platform allowed them to offer a refund solution to their students.  

Springman said she likes the Nelnet Campus Commerce Refunds because it is easy for the students and administration to use.  

“The team is great, and they are quick to respond,” Springman said. “If something happens with student payments or anything, they are very quick to get back and find a solution.”  

Springman also praised HubHelp, a virtual tool our partners can use access demos, strategies, and information about our solutions.  

Meghan Nowakowski, bursar at University of Scranton, has been working with Nelnet Campus Commerce since the summer of 2016. Her favorite part about her job is getting to work with students and their families.  

The University of Scranton started by implementing our Refund solution – Nowakowski said they knew they wanted to outsource this type of solution and sat in on one of our recurring webinars. 

“We sat on a phone call with Nelnet Campus Commerce and decided this was the product we wanted and the experience we wanted our families and students to have,” Nowakowski said.  

The institution’s IT team signed off on the implementation because they felt it was secure and would integrate well with their current systems. Any questions or concerns the IT team had were addressed quickly, Nowakowski said.  

About a year after their first Nelnet implementation, the institution was finding that their other vendor they we reusing for e-billing services was no longer providing the level of service they expected and they were looking to provide an integrated product to students and families. Nowakowski said she is all about – if it’s not broke, don’t fix it. At this point something needed to be done though.

“We love our Nelnet Campus Commerce partnership and our IT department jumped at the idea of implementing another product,” Nowakowski said.  

She expressed that the comfort level she and the institution have with our partnership is fantastic. They have had no issues with Nelnet customer service, which they had experienced in the past with another vendor.  

“We hear more and more from families – Nelnet customer service is second to none, which is also true on the school side,” Nowakowski said.  

We have two key teams that lead implementation of new solutions – the project management team and the implementation team. Knowing that every client is different, we focus on the expectations of the institution and what we can provide to simplify their day–to–day work.  

Lori Prange, Nelnet Campus Commerce implementation manager, said, “We listen to our institutions. We really want to partner and build a relationship with them through our implementation process.”

Our proven implementation process is guided by a timeline that is then altered to meet the unique needs and characteristics of each institution. That soft guideline is:  

1.  Analysis and planning 
2.  Executing 
3. Production 
4. Closing  

This article was based on a Nelnet Campus Commerce and AICUP webinar – want to check it out? Watch the full video.