More SPOC Tech Comes to Market

More technology developers are releasing new or updated software to help servicers comply with new single point of contact policies.

GCC Servicing Systems, the Southfield, Mich.-based servicing system of record provider for small to midsize and community-based financial institutions and mortgage companies, released a module to its G/SERV loan servicing platform called the Customer Service Resolution Module.

The plug-in provides servicer employees with automated assignments of customer-service action items, setting specific timeframes for completion and an audit trail of the activity. GCC said the module will help servicers adjust to the SPOC requirements.

“GCC is currently working with our clients to develop the level of automation they need to more thoroughly manage borrower communication,” said Glenn Liebowitz, president of GCC, in a press statement. “The Customer Service Resolution Module is a result of this hands-on collaboration with servicers and will assist our clients with the improved tracking of customer disputes and how they are handled.”

The consent orders issued in April to 14 of the largest U.S. mortgage servicers by Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and other federal regulators mandated the SPOC. Then in May, the Treasury Department has directed the 20 largest servicers participating in HAMP—many of which were subject to the consent orders—to follow suit.

Servicers "must establish and implement a process through which borrowers who are potentially eligible for the Home Affordable Modification Program" are assigned a relationship manager by Sept. 1, according to a supplemental directive Treasury published when it announced the new rule.

Clearwater, Fla.-based eMASON is also providing SPOC technology with the release of a new feature to its Clarifire application called the Clarifire Community portal. The company, which develops business process automated software, said the new feature improves communication and timely delivery of modification documents, including a consumer-facing portal to send correspondence and upload documents, as well as review the status of their application. It also includes auditing and reporting tools.

The new technology comes after other providers, including Xetus and Commerce Velocity, also released software for the SPOC requirements.

Some industry consultants, like Tim Gaven, a partner at Newbold Advisors, say it will not be easy for servicers to comply with the SPOC requirements.

Gaven said servicers will need “very, very smart” workers to serve as single points of contact. “They have to know everything from loss mitigation all the way through the foreclosure process,” he said.

In addition, servicing shops don’t have the information or telephone systems to have a “seamless single point of contact,” Gaven said.

In the upcoming edition of Mortgage Technology magazine—which hits print subscribers’ mailboxes on July 18—Karun Khanna, chief operating officer of Columbia, Md.-based default servicing software developer IndiSoft, writes that technology is the cost-effective approach for servicers to meet the new requirements.

“Some servicers have the mindset that implementing an SPOC model will be too expensive for the company. That is far from the truth,” Khanna writes. “In actuality, implementing technology to support this model does not require a major capital expenditure nor does it require a complete system overhaul.

“Cost effective technology available on the market today is designed to respond to this new requirement and can be implemented seamlessly with existing systems,” he continued. “It provides access to borrower information and the current status of the loss mitigation for total visibility and insight into the process.”