“Lipstick on a pig” — a case study

In this article Graham Ripley, describes How within four weeks a loan company completely transformed its origination process from a cumbersome legacy system, to a brand-new digital platform.

This well-known quote, taken from the Washington Post in 1985, convinces us that superficial change cannot hide underlying impracticality. For example, a futile attempt to make a legacy process look frictionless, when the subsequent customer experience shows that it is both cumbersome and bureaucratic, ending in in disappointment for the customer and a missed opportunity for the business.

In the case of a loan application customers generally dread gathering years of background information, filling out many forms and probably waiting days for a decision.

Even if the front-end application at first looks to them clean and modern, the reality is that the back office might rely on manual tasks (tedious enquiries, arranging surveys, progress chasing) and assembling a package for an “underwriter “to consider.

As a result of delays like this burdensome and labour-intensive barriers inhibit a successful timely relationship with the customer.

Cicero platform of Vesuvio Labs sweeps this hassle away, by re-engineering the entire process using the latest digital tools. With Cicero the application cycle is simplified resulting in higher quality data and risk-controlled, reliable, decision making. With Cicero the E2E process is streamlined to meet today’s technology-driven customer expectations.

Amazingly platforms of this quality can be built for any business, requiring customer application and back-end processing systems, in just four weeks! How is this possible?

Take as an illustration the “Acme” loan company, who recognising the flaws in their decommissioned legacy system urgently needed an agile fully functioning loan origination and management system to seize the opportunities in their current market. It had to be scalable and customised.

Cicero started work assessing Acme’s needs. Establishing with them what the essential questions were for the applicant, simplifying the key process stages and how data-collection might be radically automated. Underwriting rules were critically assessed for optimisation and workflow controls were created with the management information necessary to govern the process, end to end. Considerable attention was given to the customer portal, what the experience would feel like and look like to them; what documents were to be produced and how would they be delivered.

Business objectives were then agreed, amongst them were:

• A lean and rapid customer application experience with minimum paperwork.
• Automated text extraction, analysis and classification of application data.
• Highest possible levels of data capture security.
• Automatic collection and identification of supporting/ancillary data. EG valuations, income, construction, credit history, other current loans etc.
• Accurate and immediate processing of imported documents.
• Use of AI to automate general pre-approve /approval decisions.
• Accurate rates and payment calculations for all loan and payment types.
• Fully functioning progress dashboard for applicants and customers with the ability to view and change/build application stages.
• Minimum process delays, with instant approval/offer where possible.
• Prompt and reliable process control for any unavoidable human dependencies.
• Ability to monitor and mitigate risk at all stages of loan origination.

In parallel, with working to build all functionality for Acme loan, Cicero devised a powerful and attractive website dedicated to the customer, the product, the company and one which facilitated the application process itself.

A “back-office” support package was also created, with minimum human dependencies. One which could be operated with full security and management control in any location in the office or at home without any sacrifice of sound credit assessment, process control or vital analytics.

The result for Acme was transformative and timely. Testing was thorough; resulting in an automated digital streamlined and largely paperless, loan origination platform, with insightful analytics.

Within just four weeks customer engagement flourished, more applications turned into good quality loans and operating costs began to drop.

Vesuvio Labs is a Venture builder based in London helping entrepreneurs by accelerating the process of turning ideas into a scalable business.

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