Bankwest ink in e-signatures for home loans

Bankwest has moved to implement digital signatures for its home loan documents to reduce the settlement time on applications from a fortnight down to four days while leaving a clearer audit trail.

E-signatures can now be by both customers and brokers, reducing the turnaround on individual documents to a matter of hours Bankwest’s executive general manager of customer experience, Andrew Chanmugam said.

“Currently it takes around 13 days for a new home loan to be ready for settlement but with digital signing this can be reduced to less than four working days for new home loans to within 24 hours for increases to existing loans.”

“E-signing enables customers to sign and return their documents in a matter of hours and the e-signature can even be made on a smartphone; it’s simply a better experience for customers.”

However, the approval process still maintains a 12-hour review window to ensure brokers have the chance to review or amend the terms of the loan before the customer has seen the documents.

Ian Rakhit, Bankwest’s head of third party banking, added that the new tool gives brokers much greater visibility over exactly which documents have been issued and when.

“Thanks to the digital signing service, seconds after a new home loan is confirmed, e-documents will be sent to the broker for review and then to the customer for e-signing.

“In addition to the faster turnaround time, the new secure service maintains an electronic audit trail - a key request from brokers - and allows for faster amendments if any errors are found.”

While the new e-signing service is also billed as an opportunity for the bank to save up to 2.3 million pieces of paper a year (and thus reduce its carbon and energy footprints), mortgage forms required by Land Title offices for property purchases and refinancing transactions mean a single paper form needs to be printed out and returned by customers.

The service is yet to be rolled out to home loan transfer applications, however, Rakhit added that the bank is continuing to work with brokers to develop products and services to meet their needs.