There’s always a lot going on in the Commercial Loan Servicing department, says manager Cheryl Lang. Fortunately, they’ve got the power to handle it. “Each team member has developed their own area of expertise over the years, but there is so much collaboration amongst the team,” Cheryl says. “It’s nice for everyone to know they can rely on each other for assistance at any time, if needed.” Our featured branch last time was Howard.

Commercial Loan Servicing — looking a little “sketchy” — from left to right: Cheryl Lang, Kathy Tetzlaff, Nicole McKenzie, Theresa Krznarich, Ron Olson, and Loretta Bondi.

Personnel
Cheryl Lang, Commercial Loan Servicing Manager
Loretta Bondi, Senior Commercial Loan Servicing Analyst
Theresa Krznarich, Senior Commercial Loan Servicing Analyst
Nicole McKenzie, Commercial Loan Servicing Analyst
Ron Olson, Business Process Analyst
Kathy Tetzlaff, Commercial Loan Servicing Analyst

What is your department’s main purpose, and what are the services it provides?
Our main purpose is to provide loan servicing support to commercial loan customers after the loan is closed, until it matures or the customer pays it off. This includes providing customer support to external customers, as well as supporting the other areas of commercial lending throughout the bank — lenders, credit analysts, loan processing and closing, post-closing, and the workout area. Once the loan is closed, we enter all the loan data into one of the servicing systems and fund the loan. After that, we provide answers to billing questions, payment processing issues, payoff quotes — and any other inquiry relating to our commercial loans!

What tasks are performed by the various job titles in your department?
We don’t have a lot of titles in the department. Every person in the department has been cross-trained to handle all tasks performed by the department, but we have also made sure we have written procedures for everything we do.

What are some things you’d like other departments or branches to know about what your department does?
Everything! Well, everything after a commercial loan is closed, that is. All of the commercial loan servicing is handled centrally by our team only, due to the complexity of the portfolio. We manually fund and upload every commercial loan to the Fiserv systems. This entails ensuring that the loan is coded properly on the system and that all of the loan terms are entered and calculated correctly. If there are data entry and calculation errors, the customer’s billing statement will be wrong and the bank could stand to lose a lot of money, due to the size of the loans. Once the loan is entered into the system, the team scans all of the initial loan documentation, along with any correspondence throughout the life of the loan. We answer any questions our customers may have regarding their bills, payments, loan history, and more.

Our group is responsible for the tracking of any financial statements necessary, according to the loan documentation, along with monitoring insurance requirements. The team also provides commercial loan payoff statements, special payment processing, payment reversals and/or corrections, subordinations, and satisfactions. We also perform a final QC of all documentation and loan terms, to make sure that everything is entered and documented correctly. This includes, but is not limited to, reviewing loan closing statements, signatures, collateral/financial tracking, and data entry.

What events or projects or times of the year keep your department especially busy?
Every month end, quarter end, fiscal year end, and calendar year end are busy times for our area, with loan booking, loan change requests, and workout support. We also experience influxes of activity during escrow disbursement time (mid-December), escrow analysis time (mid-February), the interest statement issue deadline (Jan 31), and tax return filing deadlines (mid-April, then again in October for extended filings). We always have the daily calls and other projects in between, too!

Any personal celebrations or milestones among the people at your department recently?
We’ve had many milestones to celebrate in 2015: In February, Loretta celebrated her 10-year anniversary; in June, Theresa celebrated her fifth year; and Kathy celebrated her 30th year with North Shore Bank this month! We also had Nicole’s 16th anniversary this year, and my 12th, and we will celebrate Ron’s 31st in December!

What’s a great work story from your department?
We have so many funny moments with each other over the years; it’s too hard to pick just one! What is so great about our department, in general, is that we treat each other like family every day. It makes our department fun, being around people every day whose company we truly enjoy — who encourage, support, and are mindful of one another. Each success is celebrated, as it contributes to the overall success of our team.

Any exciting or noteworthy developments on the horizon for your department?
We have an upgrade from Baker Hill to Advisor (the bank’s commercial analytics and tracking software) rolling out by the end of the year, which has been spearheaded by Ron. We also continue our quest to convert all commercial loans to one master system, but this depends solely on Fiserv enhancements. There are always continuous improvement efforts in the works, too!