Broker franchisee praises easy-to-use platform
SmartData, LMG’s new automated clients data collection tool, is proving to be a gamechanger for mortgage brokers, cutting hours off labour-intensive tasks and boosting productivity.
The data tool, which was developed by LMG and launched in May, is now being used by 750 LMG broker businesses in a pilot. The brokers are sending more than 3,500 SmartData fact finds every month.
SmartData automates the integration of broker clients’ raw data into MyCRM, slashing lodgement times by 35%.
To find out how SmartData improves efficiency and streamlines what can sometimes be laborious client processes for brokers, MPA spoke to Jasmine Bunter (pictured above left), the franchisee at Loan Market Geraldton, based in the mid-west region of Western Australia.
Bunter’s team includes a part-time broker, Chelsea Bradburn, and three full-time support staff.
Introducing SmartData
Bunter said she wasn’t part of the original SmartData pilot and it wasn’t introduced for brokers in WA until the end of May.
However, because two new Loan Market Geraldton staff were starting work at the beginning of May, Bunter sought and received permission to access SmartData at the same time as Victoria did in early May, so her staff could use it when embarking on their new roles.
“The support staff were able to use it straight away and this gave us the brokers and other support staff time to figure out how it works, what the issues are and send it to ourselves,” Bunter said.
“That’s always a good start – you can see what the customer is receiving, how it works and then you can explain it to the customer as well.”
Bunter said learning how to use SmartData had been “super easy”.
“I'm reasonably tech savvy … and I love change. Lots of people hate change. It’s one of those things that you have to embrace – change always happens. Rather than fighting it, why not get on to it, see how it works and stay ahead of the game.”
Bunter said at some point competitors such as Aussie and Mortgage Choice would bring in similar technology but Loan Market was out in front by introducing SmartData now.
Easy, safe way to collect information
SmartData provides easy and fast steps to collect information from clients to verify their identity, collect bank statements and discover other data needed to assist mortgage customers.
Bunter said by simply taking a photo of their driver’s licence, all the personal details contained on the customer’s licence, such as date of birth, expiry date and licence number, was automatically entered into MyCRM.
This avoids the need for customers to send through a copy of their licence and for manual input of that information.
“The other thing with the driver’s licence is that it will automatically behind the scenes, do a credit check and a credit report on the client – all that information feeds straight into MyCRM,” said Bunter.
“It will tell us straight away if they have a credit card, if they have a home loan already … it will also make a note if they have any directorships on any companies … any bad repayment history.”
SmartData also requires clients to provide their bank statements. This requires logging into bankstatements.com but is branded as SmartData and the bank statements data is uploaded directly into MyCRM.
Bunter said by safely verifying ID, gathering credit history and bank statements through the SmartData portal, it helped prevent fraud and kept client information safe as they were not emailing documents and prone to hackers.
Employment and income data
LMG is currently piloting the ability to verify and auto-populate PAYG income, including salary, overtime, bonus and allowance, via SmartData through connection to employer HR systems with plans to release this next year.
LMG group executive customer experience Jason Furnell (pictured above right) said SmartData was revolutionary in the way it onboarded clients.
While the Online Fact Find tool had been used for a long time and was a very successful tool for brokers, Furnell said the “onus had still been on clients to fill out this enormous form”.
“SmartData integrates with a number of third party services to automatically populate the fact form on behalf of the client,” Furnell said. “It's a pretty powerful suite of tools that makes brokers look good in front of their clients but genuinely makes the client experience easier.”
Furnell talked about the extension of SmartData to include income and employment information in the pilot with Verification Exchange, a new service provided by Equifax.
“We are the first aggregator to integrate with that service. It pulls pay-as-you-go income and employment records from their service, which is based on the HR platform information,” he said.
“It does all the work of supplying employer details and the income without the client having to do anything … we see it as the future of employment income verification. It’s a big step forward.”
As a participant in the SmartData pilot, Bunting said during the credit check process the system had the ability to acquire employment and income information but not all the time.
“At this point in time, it’s about a one in 10 hit so not everything is coming through,” Bunter said. “We’re still having to manually having to work out where the client's employment and income is for most of our customers.”
But LMG had indicated that as of November this could improve to a one-in-four hit.
“For the clients which it has succeeded in bringing through this information, it’s been brilliant. It puts in all their employees' details, ABN numbers and then it has worked out their income exactly as it should be – I haven’t had to change any of that income when I’ve viewed their payslips ... it’s a very cool feature.”
Saving time and boosting productivity
Bunter described SmartData as a great time saver. “I don't know who wants to sit there and enter 20 bank account statements and balances and account numbers when it's all there and it does it for you.”
SmartData also collects living expenses data extracted from bank statements and itemises those living expenses.
“You still have to double check expenses because for example people at Christmas might have extra retail spending which is not normal expenditure going forward but it still gives you an amazing view on where they spend their money and how they spend their money.”
Bunter said SmartData saved an hour of time per client. “If you’ve got to enter five clients' data per day, that’s five hours saving per day.”
She said her support staff who saved all of that client information loved SmartData and were disappointed when on rare occasions clients refused to use it.
The benefits were not so much for brokers, unless they were single operators, but for their support staff. Bunting said it improved productivity for support staff.
“It gives them the ability to do other things for you as a broker as well, which leads to more business and more appointments.”
What do you think of SmartData? Comment below.
