Red Canoe Credit Union partners with Alloy and Lumin Digital to transform member growth through digital account opening
 

The Challenge: Increasing growth without introducing more risk

Red Canoe Credit Union faced a common dilemma: how to increase growth safely without exposing the credit union to fraud risk. The credit union serves members across a sprawling footprint in Washington State. Half of its branches sit in the Pierce-King County corridor. Two large counties in the middle have no physical presence, and the rest of the branches cluster in the Cowlitz market to the south.

“In order to grow, digital acquisition had to become a huge priority,” said Jerrod. “We were limiting ourselves to people who were willing to drive to a branch. That was our growth circle—and it wasn’t good enough.”

The digital front door existed, but it wasn’t working. Only 36% of started applications were ever completed. The process averaged more than eight minutes, workflow customization was limited, and 100% of applications were routed for manual review.

“We had a lot of volume on our previous platform but very little completion,” said Amy. “We tried to rework the process multiple times to increase pull-through, but weren’t successful.”

“The old process to enroll someone in online banking was difficult,” said Erik Halvorson, Digital Service Delivery Manager. “It would be manually reviewed, maybe approved a few hours later, and then we had to contact the member and say, ‘Here’s your member number—make sure you save this so you can type it in when you click register.’ It was completely manual and disconnected."

“We even had a customized letter in DocuSign, but nobody reads all the documents in DocuSign—they just sign and close it,” Amy added. “We ended up with a lot of phone calls asking, ‘What’s my member number?’ It was a real roadblock.”

Red Canoe needed a digital account opening solution with auto-approvals, seamless enrollment and onboarding into digital banking, and marketing tools that could reach members inside the platform they already use. Lumin’s Digital Account Opening solution— integrated with Alloy for identity verification and fraud detection—offered that connected path.

Red Canoe also valued what came with the technology. The credit union operates with a strong data culture and a leadership model built around member experience. They needed a partner that would reliably execute alongside them.

The solution: Alloy and Lumin team up to transform Red Canoe's onboarding

Red Canoe chose Lumin for digital account opening and Alloy for identity verification and fraud prevention, giving the credit union a more connected path from application to onboarding. The combined experience replaced a heavily manual process with automated decisioning, built-in fraud checks, and a smoother member journey inside the digital channels members were already using.

With Alloy embedded in the Lumin experience, Red Canoe could auto-decision more applications while giving reviewers better signals when manual review was needed. That helped the team move away from reviewing every application by hand, reduce friction for good members, and catch fraud earlier in the process. 

The results: More members, less friction, reduced fraud, stronger engagement

Automation with Lumin and Alloy meant a fundamental shift in how Red Canoe processed applications—and that required trust.

“It was scary, for sure,” Erik said. “For the first six months, we looked at every single application to make sure we could tweak things and adjust workflows. We’ve now reworked how apps are processed. One person specializes in manual reviews; another specializes in declines and adverse action decisions.”

One step proved especially effective. The team back-tested a batch of applications from the old system through the new Alloy-powered workflow.

“Allowing the staff to see that 64% of the back-tested approvals would be auto-approved built confidence in the process,” Amy said.

The digital group in the contact center, freed from reviewing every application, now redirects time to ITM (interactive teller machine) calls and deeper dialogue with members.

Digital membership growth 

Red Canoe saw an 81% increase in new online memberships that were open and fully funded.

“As far as application starts, we didn’t see a massive increase,” said Amy. “That’s more of a function of Marketing spend. What changed, however, was application completions, and that’s where we saw the difference.”

Submission rate

The percentage of applications that were started and submitted jumped from 36% to 71%, driven by a shorter, smoother experience that cut average completion time from more than eight minutes to about five.

Operational efficiency 

Seventy-four percent of all applications submitted, whether approved or declined, are now auto-decisioned. Of those that are approved, 80% are auto-approved. When applications do require review, staff have far better tools.

“Our previous platform didn’t offer ways to evaluate applications,” Erik said. “Now we have Socure and other data solution offerings in Alloy within the Lumin platform that give reviewers a lot more tools. If an application goes to manual review, staff know exactly what they need to look at to approve or deny it.”

Fraud detection

Before Red Canoe adopted Alloy’s Fraud Attack Radar, a bot attack slipped partially through. When a similar attack occurred after implementation, the system caught it, and the team activated a “Stop the Bleed” protocol that added friction and removed auto-approvals in one click.

Now with Lumin and Alloy, Red Canoe can identify fraudulent applicants before they get inside the door and before any monetary transactions occur.

Digital adoption and eStatements

“Our digital banking adoption rate for new members in the first 30 days, percentage-wise, used to be in the low 60s,” Amy said. “Since the system now drops auto-approvals straight into digital banking, 80% enroll in online banking at account opening.”

eStatement enrollment has reached the high 90s. “Now, when you go into online banking, you’re automatically opted into e-statements. You can opt out, but it’s part of the workflow,” Amy said.

In-app marketing that converts 

With Lumin’s CMS, the marketing team launched a January campaign encouraging members to start an emergency fund by opening a secondary savings account with auto transfers.

“The goal for our marketing campaign was a 250% increase in new secondary savings account openings,” Amy said. “We ended up at around a 1055% increase over the previous 12-month baseline because members could click, open the account, name it, and start an auto-transfer to fund the account immediately. The friction was gone.

“Our members visit our website and log in immediately— they’re not browsing our homepage,” she added. “CMS puts messaging directly in their hands, two to three times a week. We can target based on member needs or demographics.”

Deep linking amplified the impact. “We can send members directly to a form,” Amy said. “We launched a new checking account with a one-step conversion form. Marketing doesn’t have to explain a long workflow. Members click, submit, and they’re done.”

Looking ahead: A new way of thinking and building

The numbers matter. But for Red Canoe’s leadership, the deeper shift is organizational.

“When you have systems that are stifling, you build a culture of ‘no,’” Amy said. “After launching Lumin and Alloy, we’re instead building a culture of curiosity— ’How could we do this differently? How could we make this easier online?’ It’s shifting from telling members to call us to asking, ‘How can we build this with a digital delivery?’”

“Our digital banking on Lumin and Alloy is built for the person on the couch,” Erik added. “It’s for the person who thinks, ‘If I have to get up and grab my wallet, I’m not doing it.’”