How to accelerate financial agreements with the digitisation of core processes

The financial services industry – like many others – experienced massive change in 2020. Forced into new ways of operating, technology came to the fore to help organisations and their customers continue to do business.

Huge pats on the back to those who quickly responded to the crisis with loan deferrals, early access to super, changes to insurance premiums, and so on. It really was remarkable to watch massive organisations change their processes and policies so swiftly – with customers’ best interests in mind.

Now, financial services organisations have their sights set on cementing some of the changes that were brought in last year. Realising the time and cost savings of doing business digitally – not to mention the huge improvements to the customer experience – they are looking at ways to embed more automation and digitisation into business processes.

It’s a topic that’s close to our hearts here at Docusign. Which is why we recently held this webinar on accelerating financial agreements, with great input from Stuart Ward, Director of Industry Strategy, Financial Services at Salesforce, and Chris Sims, Chief Product Officer at Positive Group.

If you haven’t seen it, you can catch up now. Or read on for a recap and some further insights. 

Taking the friction out of finance

As discussed in the webinar, customers today expect to transact digitally. To meet this expectation, the financial services world needs to ditch the paper and go digital, rooting out manual handling, double entry of data and other bottlenecks to growth. They need to gain visibility into transactions, and redeploy resources from processing agreements into growth. 

In short, firms need to modernise their systems of agreement.

According to Ward, three key traits consistently appear in organisations that have modernised the agreement process. These traits – which enabled organisations to respond quickly to COVID-19 – all tie back to the digitisation of agreements, from the moment they are prepared right through to signing and managing at the other end of their journey.

Firstly, agreements need to be transparent for all. From the employee who sets it up, to the colleagues, intermediaries and even the end customer who touch the agreement along the way, everyone needs to see what’s going on. Ward likens transparency in agreements to smashing down a kitchen wall in a restaurant. When diners can see the cooks in the kitchen, everything becomes cleaner.

Then there’s collaboration. Real-time collaboration around a loan application record helps all stakeholders know what’s expected. This becomes more powerful when paired with intelligence, the third trait. Using AI to capture and curate data can help pinpoint bottlenecks in the agreement process, and triages applications that may need more human intervention.

Finally, there’s automation. It’s possible to automate key moments in the agreement process to dramatically cut down on manual labour and speed up the agreement process. Using Docusign templates for common loan agreements is a great example here. 

Sharing a success story

Living up to its name, Positive Group is a true success story when it comes to digitisation of agreements. Not only has the Australian financial services company embraced digital agreements internally, but it seeks out those who do the same when it brokers loans for customers. 

As Sims explained in the webinar, if one of their brokers is comparing two loans from different lenders – each of which has exactly the same financial merits for a customer – then the broker would recommend the lender who uses digital agreements. Why? It generally equates to a faster loan for the customer, and a smoother experience.   

Positive Group has always had a digital mindset, and is leveraging the integration between Docusign and Salesforce for greater efficiency and a better customer experience. For example, getting signed privacy consent no longer requires the customer hunting down a printer and scanner. Instead, it’s swift and seamless – meaning that the team can now act fast to kick-start credit conversations with customers. 

Keen to learn more?

Salesforce recently released its Trends in Financial Services Report, which provides a unique perspective into the financial services industry’s evolution and what it now takes to succeed. It’s a great read for financial services organisations looking to get ahead in the new normal. Meantime, if you’d like to learn how Docusign and Salesforce can transform how your financial services organisation deals with customers, contact us today.