More and more credit unions and community banks are adopting digital communications tools – including Video Banking, Texting, and Secure Chat – for their lending team, allowing them to do more with less.
One example is Centric Federal Credit Union in Northern Louisiana. Centric saw some of the most significant improvements in its lending department by adopting digital communications tools from Eltropy. Before adopting Eltropy, Centric’s loan applications were taking around 48 hours to complete, from start to finish. With the addition of Eltropy’s secure links Texting, these applications were shortened by more than 95 percent, to 1 hour, with some applications completed as quick as 10 minutes.
Here are three specific ways in which digital communications tools are helping credit unions and community banks in the loan application process:
- Automation: Tools such as Text messaging can be set up to easily automate repetitive tasks, such as sending out loan application confirmations or follow-up messages. This frees up time for lending team members to focus on more complex tasks, such as reviewing loan applications and making lending decisions.
- Communication Efficiency: Digital communications tools can also be used to streamline communication between lending team members and loan applicants. For example, a secure, Text Messaging solution can be used to share loan application documents and communicate with applicants in real-time. This can greatly speed up the loan application process and reduce the need for multiple in-person meetings.
- Data Analysis: Such digital communications tools can also be used to analyze data to identify patterns and trends that will help improve lending decisions. For example, data analysis can help identify which loan products are most popular, which loan applications are most likely to be approved, and which loan applicants are most likely to default on their loans. This can help lending team members make more informed lending decisions and reduce the risk of loan defaults.
While Text as a method of communication has shown to be a proven best practice in selling and funding loan processes, a Text Messaging solution that is part of a complete digital communications platform provides a higher level of effectiveness and productivity vs. a Text-only solution.
For example, Secure Chat and Co-browsing are also an important part of the platform, as they allow loan officers to view the borrower’s browser window in a secure and compliant way, in guiding the borrower without taking over their control of their desktop or device.
In conclusion, digital communications can greatly benefit a financial institution’s lending team by allowing them to automate repetitive tasks, streamline communication, and analyze data to make more informed lending decisions. This can help the team to do more with less, working more efficiently and effectively to help their members and customers in the place, time and channel of their choosing.
