A non-major bank has applauded itself for delivering an average turnaround time of five business days since February this year, while many other lenders have struggled to provide timely decisions to their customers over the same period.
According to Auswide Bank head of loan origination services Brooke Irwin, the lender's ability to maintain a respectable time to decision is largely attributable to the feedback from the Auswide Bank Broker Journey Review which was undertaken in May last year.
Thus far, the updates instituted by the bank include process optimisation and a significant investment in technology, with a number of automation solutions still in the works.
“These initiatives factored directly off the back of our broker engagement which identified those key areas needed to deliver a better customer and broker experience,” said Irwin.
“These solutions will further increase our capacity and help reduce days to decision, with full systems functionality being phased in from September."
The Auswide exec emphasised that her team was able to maintain turnaround times even with the significant increase in volume that came from the bank's success with First Home Loan Deposit Scheme (FHLDS) applications.
Head of third party Tracy Field echoed Irwin's pride in the Auswide staff.
“We have a great FHLDS team working as a part of Loan Origination Services and our reservation process allows customers to ascertain very quickly if they are able to obtain a place under the scheme,” said Field.
“The team verify the customer’s eligibility as a part of the reservation process. This gives the customer some certainty around their next steps and removes some of the pressure that we see first home buyers experiencing as they embark on this journey.
“A key benefit of our size is that we are quite nimble with direct access to key stakeholders and decision makers. We are able to adapt process, policy and our product quickly where we see a market need or a demand,” finished Field.
