As Fifth Third prepares for the conversion of about 500,000 Comerica retail-bank customers later this year, one of the bank’s executives said “a space mission” comes to mind as an analogy.

Pat Saad, head of consumer digital at the Cincinnati-based regional bank, acknowledged space may be “top of mind” because of the recent Artemis II trip around the moon and the film “Project Hail Mary” hitting theaters, but he sees some correlations in the complex effort to shift Comerica customers onto Fifth Third’s platforms.

Fifth Third completed its acquisition of Dallas-based Comerica in February, giving the bank about $294 billion in assets. The conversion is targeted for Labor Day weekend, bank executives have said, and Fifth Third plans to communicate the event to customers well in advance, Saad said in a recent interview. 

All lines of business have a role in the bank-wide endeavor, he said. The first phase of the project has involved completing “extensive discovery” on Comerica customers and their products, experiences and features, and mapping those to existing Fifth Third offerings, Saad said.

“We're trying to proactively identify where there's a gap, where there could be something that's different, where there could be friction, and then have a documented plan to address it,” he said. That could include a small digital capability or a difference in limit for a particular financial product, he said.

Next, Fifth Third is preparing to move into a series of “full dress rehearsals,” he said. That involves practicing the actual conversion repeatedly through a “disciplined process,” to ensure customers experience a smooth, reliable experience on Day One, he said.

The final phase involves an almost hour-by-hour plan for conversion weekend, Saad said. “In the context of digital,” that involves mulling “how can we minimize disruption as much as possible to keep Comerica customers able to perform some or most of their daily or weekly financial jobs or tasks over the course of those couple days?” he said.

Fifth Third plans to build an onboarding experience for Comerica customers that’s similar to the flow Fifth Third employs for its new customers, which is designed to get them to set up access, confirm information and draw their attention to features within digital channels, Saad said. 

The bank picks five or six things to flag for customers, although the list could be bigger. “We try to focus on an achievable set of things that we think are most relevant,” he said.

Fifth Third doesn’t want to lose any Comerica customers through the process, so everything counts, from ensuring account balances are correct to creating an onboarding process that helps customers get the most from their experience with the bank’s products and services, Saad said. To that end, Comerica customers will gain a better mobile app with more capabilities, as well as an expanded ATM network and more modern branch experiences, he noted.

“You only get one first impression,” Saad said. “All of that matters in those first few days.”

A large and expected aspect of any bank conversion: matching account numbers. Saad noted bank staff have to look across products – a safe deposit box account number for a customer in one state could duplicate a checking account number for a customer in another, for example – and it tends to be one of the most time-consuming tasks with a conversion.

There’s “a lot of time spent in general with the data,” Saad said. Understanding which product new customers will transition to and ensuring Fifth Third has accurate contact information for those customers is crucial, he said. 

The latter is something Saad said he learned through Fifth Third’s 2019 acquisition of MB Financial. The bank has rebuilt its digital channels since then, and “we feel very comfortable they can scale the way they'll need to,” he said.

While preparing for the conversion, staff are also juggling day-to-day responsibilities related to digital enhancements and innovation, Saad said.

“You do have almost daily prioritization decisions you need to make, to balance both of those things,” he said. 

The bank continues to make enhancements to SmartShield, its in-app security tool, and to its recently launched “plan” space, to expand on cashflow and spending insights, Saad said. He sees an opportunity for the bank to do more under the financial wellness umbrella. 

Saad said he believes customers would rather handle a financial task within their banking app than have to use a different app to accomplish a related task, and enabling customers to do more within the Fifth Third app can help bolster primacy for the bank. 

Fifth Third is also working on changes to its mobile app interface that would help customers more quickly find what they’re looking for or complete a task, Saad said.

To stay on top of current trends, the lender measures itself against peers, the biggest banks and fintechs, and “any and all last, best experiences that might be out there,” Saad said. “So if Delta Air Lines or Starbucks is doing something really innovative with brand expression, or design, or the blend of retail and digital offerings … we’re benchmarking those as well.” 

Consumers will “measure us not just against the other bank but against really any digital experience they might be having,” he said.