Glenview State Bank, an independently owned full-service lender for individuals and businesses in Chicago’s North Shore and environs with $885 million in assets under management, needed to upgrade its mortgage loan origination software. The old system’s vendor was phasing it out and pushing Glenview toward another solution that “would require a lot of work to implement,” recalls Bill Campbell, executive vice president of the Glenview, IL-based bank.

By switching to a supplier that could deliver both mortgage and consumer origination products in one platform and integrate them with the core banking software, Glenview hoped to increase the efficiency of its 230 employees and generate more business. Ultimately, it got all this and more.

Glenview embraced the solution offered by Milwaukee-based Metavante Corp. Metavante already supplied Glenview’s core banking and document imaging software, so its Consumer Loan Origination System (CLOS) easily interfaced with the bank’s existing infrastructure. “It made sense to bring it all under one roof,” says Campbell.

In fact, giving customers the option of bringing it all under one roof has been a key part of Metavante’s growth strategy. Over the years it has acquired complementary solutions providers to “build a suite of products that provide more value for customers not just on a stand-alone basis but on an integrated basis,” explains Cyrus Brinn, president of Metavante Lend- ing Solutions.

Synergies

Metavante’s CLOS solution streamlines consumer loan processing and enables Glenview to access customer relationship information from its core banking system. It can also access supplementary data from external sources, such as credit bureaus, and supports a variety of consumer and corporate loans such as primary and secondary mortgages, home equity lines of credit, auto loans and a broad spectrum of unsecured debt.

Besides being able to feed data seamlessly across different operational areas, saving Glenview personnel from wasting time on repetitive tasks such as re-entering information, the solution had to be capable of interacting with Freddie Mac’s loan purchasing system. It is. Glenview also wanted potential customers to be able to apply for loans over the Internet, to drive a surge in the consumer business. So besides installing Metavante’s CLOS, Glenview licensed Metavante’s Mortgage Loan Origination Software (MLOS) and its Internet-Direct Origination solution, a secure, private-label Web site that enables borrowers to submit loan applications electronically, eliminating the need for multiple installations or additional hardware while streamlining back-office operations.

“We were able to upgrade our loan systems, replace our Internet loan applications provider and get rid of excess vendors, all in one fell swoop,” marvels Campbell.

Saving Time and Money

Because so many changes were made at once, Campbell said it’s difficult to calculate the exact costs incurred. At worst, sticking with Metavante instead of going to other suppliers was cost-neutral, he adds, but “probably cost-beneficial.”

By automating many processes at speeds human hands could never hope to match, and eliminating the need to re-key data, the new system should quickly offset whatever the expense. “We’ve typically been able to show an increase in efficiency of somewhere between 15 percent and 25 percent,” says Metavante’s Brinn.

Campbell concurred. Before Metavante, Glenview could spend as much as two weeks instituting even a small change in its credit policy, tweaking its various non-interfacing systems one by one. “But with this product we just go right to the underlying decision engine and make the change once. It’s immediately carried out across the whole network,” explains Campbell. “The time savings alone is worthwhile!”

Still, implementing a complete solution like Glenview’s normally takes between 60 and 90 days, according to Brinn. For Glenview, however, it took nearly four months because “we were creating something from scratch,” Campbell says, especially referring to the new Web presence. “Ours was the beta site,” he adds, noting that the end result is much more user-friendly than its predecessor. “It’s more intuitive and therefore easier to use,” says Campbell.

Nevertheless, Metavante provided training, which “typically takes just a couple of hours,” says Brinn.

How long it will take Glenview’s staff to get up to speed depends partly on how often they execute new loans. “Some of our branches do only one or two mortgages per month,” explains Campbell, “but now all they have to do is enter the information directly over the Internet, the same way consumers do. There’s no training necessary there.”

This was an unexpected benefit. “Our branches will be able to input an application online, instead of having to refer potential mortgage customers to the main branch and perhaps losing them,” stresses Campbell. “Discovering we could use the new Internet piece for data entry from our branches was a nice surprise.”

Regulatory Compliance

There were a few complications during the transition, to be sure. All documentation produced by the system had to be in compliance with federal and local lender regulations, for instance. Institutions that announce their mortgage rates, even on the Internet, must also disclose the corresponding annual percentage yields. “We simply had to make sure this was done right. Now that it’s taken care of, we can easily feed new data into the system and it’s automatically prepared according to regulations,” says Campbell.

As yet it’s difficult to measure the productivity improvements from this new, integrated solution. Servicing it, though, should be a breeze. “Except for the Internet component, we have everything on our own servers,” says Campbell, “and we have our own IT department to take care of any problems that arise.” Just in case, however, help from Metavante is always close at hand. “Since we have so much different software from the one company, our voice will be that much louder if and when we cry for help,” Campbell notes.

Going Step-By-Step

In fact, the only thing Campbell would do differently if he could do it all over again would be to take the transition a step at a time. “With 20/20 hindsight, we probably should not have done all three pieces at once,” he says. “We should have started with just the mortgage origination system itself, instead of trying to do the consumer components at the same time. Of course, it depends on the resources you have. Everyone at Glenview had other jobs to do, too, so it was hard to set aside blocks of time for the upgrades.”

“We were able to upgrade our loan systems, replace our Internet loan applications provider and get rid of excess vendors, all in one fell swoop,” marvels Campbell.

Metavante’s Brinn advises moving slowly and carefully. “Be methodical about identifying precisely what you need from a system, what your objectives are,” he suggests. “Canvass the market, pinpoint viable solutions that pass through your filters, then select two or three for a more in-depth due-diligence examination. Look at not just the latest technology but the roadmap for its future possibilities. Look at the underlying financial position of the technology provider. If you’re going to spend time and money changing your systems, the result should generate benefits for at least five years if not more. The longer, the better.”

One key to the success of Glenview’s upgrades was its close working relationship with Metavante. “Metavante was willing to listen to what we had to say about how the system should work and look,” says Campbell. “It’s important when you’re doing a new development like this to have a partner who is easy to work with.”

It’s too soon to measure the results of Glenview’s integrated upgrade and, in fairness, the mortgage market has changed a great deal since the bank began exploring its upgrade options. Fortunately, Glenview has been spared the brunt of the credit crunch. “The overall mortgage market might have slowed down considerably, but we’ve never been a subprime lender so the impact on us has been much smaller than anticipated,” shares Campbell. “From our point of view, the playing field has been leveled in our favor.”

Indeed, recent reductions at and outright closings of innumerable mortgage brokers have left many homebuyers desperate for legitimate, established, trustworthy loan purveyors – perhaps especially those with a “bricks-and-mortar presence in the community,” says Brinn. “Local institutions like Glenview fit the bill perfectly.”

To meet what promises to be growing demand, Campbell reiterated the potential savings of time and money from using Metavante’s comprehensive solutions packages. “The myriad tie-ins and interfaces with the core system eliminate the most repetitive tasks,” Campbell says. “More importantly, without having to re-key so much data we’re less likely to make errors.”

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www.metavante.com

By Ben Mattlin