Credit Unions Improve Commercial Lending Game

Many credit unions seek to raise their commercial loans level. Two of them, one in Ohio, the other in Washington, used slightly different efficiencies to successfully raise their business lending game.

The $4.2 billion Beavercreek, Ohio-based Wright-Patt Credit Union, with 356,000 members and 31 branches, mostly in the Dayton area, wanted to digitize the commercial lending process and focus on growth and serving business members.

WPCU raised their commercial loan portfolio 156% year over year, using a cloud solution combining Wilmington, N.C.-based nCino’s Bank Operating System integrated with e-signatures from Chicago-based eSignLive by VASCO.

“In the last two years, we have increased our capacity of lending per borrower from $5 million to $15 million. We were processing 30-40 loans a month. For several months running, we’ve had 100 loans in production in a month,” Ben Miller, commercial portfolio manager, Wright-Patt Credit Union, said.

WPCU serves the business community through its Member Business Services department. In 2017, WPCU’s Commercial Lending team processed over 650 business loans – an increase of 65% over the previous year.

The WPCU commercial lending department used to just focus on serving mostly small businesses, but their leadership saw growth opportunities in mid-market commercial clients. WPCU took the first toward this with the implementation of the nCino Bank Operating System in 2016. Miller explained the credit union found nCino offered the best data analytics and reporting and credits the system with transforming their commercial lending processes.

Another credit union, the $2.1 billion Spokane Valley, Wash.-based Numerica, wanted to escalate its business lending program as well.

Ken Plank, chief lending officer for Numerica, which has almost 140,000 members and 21 branches throughout central and eastern Washington and the Idaho panhandle, recalled “senior management and the board saw the benefit in commercial lending, and the decision was made back then to expand.” This included adding good quality staff, diversifying the credit union’s portfolio away from just investor real estate, and using technology to gain efficiencies. That is where the credit union’s partnership with ProfitStars, a global division of Monett, Mo.-based Jack Henry & Associates, really kicked in.

The credit union raised its outstanding loans from $75 million to $600 million in about five-years. ProfitStars, which innovates software, solutions, and technology, provided the integration on a variety of platforms to help Numerica better serve its members and support that growth pattern, according to Plank. “Our goal has been a cohesive member experience from first contact all the way through portfolio management.”

Read the full article in the May 23 issue of CU Times.