Spescom Software Inc, the US subsidiary of JSE-listed ICT group, Spescom Ltd, today announced that First National Motor Finance (FNMF), a member of the Abbey National Group, has successfully implemented an IT system utilising Spescom's eB solution to significantly reduce the time it takes to process requests for motor vehicle finance.
Spescom's eB integrated document, configuration and records management (iDCR) solutions sits at the heart of the new system providing the vault technology that captures, stores and retrieves information related to the finance request.
The provision of motor vehicle finance is a highly competitive business where the ability to respond quickly is key to winning business. Typically motor dealers will approach more than one finance organisation on behalf of a customer wishing to purchase a vehicle. Generally the first finance house to respond wins the business.
Carl Mostert, CEO of Spescom Software, stated: "We are pleased that FNMF has chosen a system containing Spescom's eB suite to replace its relatively slow, labour-intensive paper- and microfiche-based system. The new system will reduce the amount of necessary data input and decrease the incidence of keyboarding errors through the use of Intelligent Character Recognition (ICR), as well as allow for concurrent processing of applications and faster retrieval of documents. By teaming with Spescom, FNMF will increase its competitive-edge and reduce overheads."
In a two-stage implementation, FNMF first replaced paper and microfilm with scanned documents to drive the following results:
* Reduce response time to the initial financing request from 3-4 hours to 10-15 minutes;
* Reduce long processing backlogs; and
* Enable instant desktop retrieval of documents which previously took 1 to 3 weeks.
The recently completed second stage has streamlined the process even further through the use of automated data capture, resulting in:
* Further reductions in the number of people required to input and fund;
* A further reduction in response time to just five minutes;
* Improvements in the consistency of response through automating 90% of underwriting decisions; and
* Minimising the number of contacts with the motor dealer.
Commenting on the system, Mark Scott, Project Leader at FNMF, said: "Smart processing will give us a competitive-edge in the world of vehicle finance. It is our aim to automate as much of the process involved in receiving an application for vehicle finance and processing it through underwriting and funding. Spescom Software's eB iDCR software suite is a key part of that process."
FNMF is a member of the Abbey National Group and one of the UK's leading finance houses. The Retail Finance division of First National has been supplying point of sale finance to the retail market for over 40 years. The company works with retailers to provide over two million customers with the financial deal that is right for them.
Abbey National plc is the UK's sixth largest banking group as measured by assets and the country's second largest mortgage lender. Abbey National plc and its subsidiaries offer a comprehensive range of personal financial services, including savings and investments, mortgages, banking, pensions, unit trusts, life and general insurance products, as well as secured and unsecured lending, to over 16 million customers in the UK. In addition, Abbey National's wholesale banking arm (Abbey National Treasury Services plc) is a leading participant in the international financial markets.
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Spescom Limited is an information and communications technology company listed on the JSE Securities Exchange SA, with operations in the US, UK and SA.
The group is active in two main areas of the world IT market, namely offering product and solutions to connect to the networked economy, and the provision of software solutions to manage information and knowledge.
The strategic focus is on the convergence of knowledge, document, configuration and voice transaction management technologies.
Spescom DataVoice is a subsidiary of Spescom Limited and is dedicated to the development and global marketing of its DataVoice products in the area of capture, management, and recreation of live data.
Spescom holds the controlling interest in US-based Spescom Software Inc, a Nasdaq-, OTCBB-listed company, and developer of the award-winning eB software suite.
In SA, Spescom, in alliance with world-leading companies such as Cisco and Avaya, provides a range of customer contact and intelligent network solutions to its blue-chip customer base.
The company is a leading supplier of communications solutions and products to network operators and service providers on the African continent.
For more information on Spescom, please visit www.spescom.com.
Spescom eB
eB is a registered trademark of Spescom Software Inc. eB comprises an extensive set of software components that together form the foundation for an extremely flexible and powerful information management platform. eB's components include: document management; records management; item management; change management; configuration management and workflow components. These components are tightly integrated with CAD, GIS, office and email applications to capture and view information. The full functionality of eB is available via a set of APIs that enable the rapid definition and deployment of customer specific solutions and integration with other line-of-business applications including ERP, CRM, SCM, maintenance management and project management products.
Spescom Software, Inc
Spescom Software (OTCBB:ALTS - News) delivers enterprise e-business solutions that provide rapid access to accurate information in context to assets, products and processes, resulting in improved customer satisfaction, productivity and safety. It achieves this through a tightly integrated suite of document, configuration and records management technologies that not only allows it to capture and securely store information, but also organizes and structures this information to place it in context.
Key customers include Continental Airlines, AmerenUE, Entergy, City of Winston-Salem, Britannia Airways, Eastern Municipal Water District, Sempra, Northeast Utilities, London Underground, Mack Trucks, Railtrack, Ocean Energy, and many others.