What Happens When You Link A Lending System To A Decision Engine?

MADISON, WI / AUSTIN, TX - The CUNA Mutual Group and FIData announced an alliance that is designed to significantly reduce lending costs for credit unions while enabling them to serve members faster.

By combining CUNA Mutual's loanliner.com with FIData's consumer lending decision engine, both parties say they have created a state-of-the-art lending tool that is flexible, user friendly and allows credit unions to cut loan processing time and expenses. Introduced in April 1998, the FIData consumer lending system is the credit union industry leader with more than 110 client institutions serving 5 million consumers. The industry standard, CUNA Mutual's LOANLINER? loan application system is currently used by more than 7,000 credit unions. LOANLINER's Internet application, loanliner.com, has 550 users.

"Linking FIData's V4 loan decision engine and loanliner.com combines the core lending competencies of both organizations and packages them into a state-of-the-art lending tool for credit unions. This includes the experience of FIData's second generation engine and CUNA Mutual Group's history of helping credit unions innovate their lending operations," said Todd Proulx, CUNA Mutual strategic partners manager. "Using this tool, credit unions can serve their members faster than ever before. They can also add high-quality loans to their portfolios while automating their forms and decision process. This should increase service and reduce operation time and expenses."

The companies estimate credit unions that use the combined lending system could cut their lending costs nearly in half depending on their current operations.

"According to some statistics available from Federal Reserve, it costs credit unions an average of $75 to $100 to make a new car or home equity loan in the traditional way," said Blake Allen, FIData president & CEO. "We can help trim 25 to 40 percent of those costs, help improve member service and add quality loans to the portfolio, all at the same time."

The CUNA Mutual/FIData system offers automated lending decisions based on proprietary and/or national credit scores, credit union data, custom score cards and other factors along with a credit union's customized credit approval rules. The combined technologies result in the most flexible lending system in the credit union marketplace today.

"When we work with a credit union, we don't ask them to bend their lending to fit our decision engine, we built our engine to accommodate their criteria," said Allen. "Using loanliner.com with the V4 loan decision engine, credit unions can even change their rules and rates on the fly." In addition, it can emulate, or mirror, a credit union's current decision process. "The engine is fast and can provide instant online and in-branch loan approval."

The system can be placed on a credit union's Web site so members can apply for a loan 24/7, or it can be used as a desktop application for in-house loan processing staff. It can also be used as a tool for auto dealers or other third-party lending affiliates. "This online loan approval system incorporates a credit union's loan-granting guidelines, automates them and makes them available to members, lending staff and lending partners 24 hours a day, 7 days a week," Allen said.

By using loanliner.com with FIData decisioning, credit unions can:

Give members 24/7 access to lending services;
Provide front and back office staff with a cost-saving lending tool;
Perform all loan application data and credit union data logic functions;
Calculate customized debt-to-income ratios;
Vary calculations by loan product type (for example, credit cards and loans can be calculated in different ways);
Produce reports and perform system administration online;
Use any major credit bureau;

"The combination of loanliner.com and the FIData V4 decision engine can be the only way a credit union performs lending functions," said Proulx. "The system can be used by the member on-site, Web borrowers can access it and credit union front and back office staff can use it to perform lending transactions."

For more information about CUNA Mutual visit www.cunamutual.com. For information on loanliner.com visit www.loanliner.com or call your Account Relationship Manager at (800) 333-2644.

The CUNA Mutual Group is the leading financial services provider to credit unions and their members worldwide, offering insurance, investment and technological solutions through strategic relationships and modern service channels.

About FIData
FIData, Inc. is the premier provider of instant online loan approval services for the financial services. Processing approximately 100,000 loans totaling $1.1 billion in 2000, this online loan engine allows participating lenders to offer their borrowers instant loan approval within seconds, on a 24x365 basis. As an Application Service Provider (ASP), FIData provides the power of its loan underwriting technology via the Internet in a secure environment, requiring no hardware or software purchases from their clients. FIData is an Austin, Texas-based company and a wholly owned subsidiary of Billing Concepts Corp. (NASDAQ: BILL), and is led by executives with extensive experience with Internet technology and the financial services industry. Located on the World Wide Web at www.fidata.com, FIData has served financial institutions since 1988.