Financial Exploitation Training for Credit Unions

AARP’s BankSafe training combines industry knowledge and experience with a state-of-the-art, online learning experience. AARP worked with more than 2,000 financial industry professionals to develop the training platform’s content and interactive scenarios. The platform is one of few designed specifically for frontline staff, supervisors, financial advisors and compliance officers.

Users learn how to identify potential financial exploitation and take the right actions to stop it. In fact, researchers from Virginia Tech Center for Gerontology found that employees trained with AARP BankSafe were able to save an average of 12 times more money per employee from financial exploitation than employees trained with other methods. To learn more, please read the full report or report summary.

The AARP BankSafe Training Curriculum

The AARP BankSafe platform includes five modules, each with short, bite-sized education and training exercises, that employees can complete at their own pace or in one sitting. The five modules comprising the roughly one-hour training are organized to help employees:

1. Learn about financial exploitation and its impact on both older Americans and your financial institution.
2. Identify red flags for financial exploitation.
3. Develop skills to ask the right questions and take the right actions when they suspect financial exploitation.
4. Understand state-specific reporting requirements and available community resources.
5. Practice and put newfound skills to the test.

AARP will present a personalized certificate to all employees that complete the BankSafe training course so that their peers and clients understand their commitment to stopping the exploitation of older adults.

Register Your Credit Union

Registering your credit union and setting up your employees is easy, with a short video to show you the registration process so you’ll know what to expect. When you register your credit union, you’ll be able to preview the entire training before you sign-up your employees. Choose between two options to create accounts for your employees: sending them a link so they can create their own accounts or uploading their email addresses and they will receive an email from BankSafe to activate their account.

Learn more about the program and sign up at www.aarp.org/banksafe.

BankSafe Administrative Reporting

The AARP BankSafe training platform includes administrative reporting tools that will allow you, and those you provide with administrator credentials, to see employee progress and performance. The reporting tools include printable, customized reports that you can use for internal purposes or for use in coordination with regulators. Please note that when provided the registration option between ‘Detailed Account’ and ‘Basic Account’, we recommend choosing ‘Detailed Account’, allowing you and your managers to access the training’s reporting tools on a more detailed, branch or service center basis, in addition to an organization-wide one.

AARP BankSafe Credit Union Certification  

Once your credit union has implemented the training, you can apply to have AARP verify that at least 80 percent of your frontline staff successfully passed the BankSafe training and confirm that your credit union has a financial-exploitation escalation or reporting policy. Qualifying credit unions can apply to receive a seal from AARP, good for one year, recognizing their commitment to fighting exploitation. 

 

                  FOR CREDIT UNIONS                                                                                             

 

       

 

 

 

 

                  FOR CU EMPLOYEES

 

 

 

 

 

 

Additional Resources for Employees

Frontline employees are often in the best position to recognize and prevent financial exploitation. 

• Elder Abuse Training Presented in Partnership with RI AG Office - November 15, 2021
• Spotting Red Flags
• Deciphering Dementia in Your Members
• Know Suspicious Activity When You See It
• Asking the Right Questions
• The APS Reporting Process
• Preventing Elder Financial Exploitation: Employee Training Manual for Financial Institutions 
  • An Initiative of the Office of Consumer Affairs & Business Regulation, the Executive Office of Elder Affairs, and the Massachusetts Division of Banks 

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* For the past three years, the Cooperative Credit Union Association has been supporting credit unions by providing a complimentary elder financial exploitation prevention training solution for their employees through their CU Senior Safeguard program.  The CU Senior Safeguard  training program will not be available after February 28, 2021.