Tax Credit Investment Solution

Background

As one of the top 10 commercial banks in the United States, the leader in NMTC investments and a top 10 LIHTC and HTC investor, our client required organization and automation of their business processes in order to improve performance. Several attempts had been made toward this goal, utilizing both custom software solutions and off-the-shelf software. It was discovered that these implementations were heavily labor-intensive and created serious disruptions in existing operations, while not adding any efficiency gains.

The Challenge

As with other enterprise-level firms, our client sought solutions for integrating and automating their complex business processes. Analysis identified three specific target areas of complexity:

Complexities in Business Processes

• A large quantity of new investment entities are structured each year
• A massive number of documents and spreadsheets are associated with each transaction
• Numerous process steps are involved in structuring and approving each investment
• “Piles of paper” are moved through their process, with wide variance as to document chronology and ordering

Complexities in Compliance/Monitoring

• Extensive State and Federal tax credit reporting and compliance requirements created concern about meeting audit requirements for governments, partnerships, and internal use
• The need existed to closely monitor investments and recycled funds to comply with long-term compliance requirements
• Unique requirement compliance for partnership agreements and a range of investments were of concern

Complexities in Reporting

• A multitude of data sources and repositories existed, with no efficient query method in place. Additionally, there were challenges with verifying that available data was accurate and up-to-date, with long cycle times to generate reports

The Solution

After extensive learning and analysis, the ProLink team crafted a series of solutions to overcome this financial institution’s challenges. Based upon the understanding that enterprise-level firms often have business systems that coexist but don’t cooperate, data boundaries were mapped around existing processes. ProLink was able to adapt to this client’s unique business process requirements dynamically – at once assembling, assimilating and automating data from all systems, seamlessly. Each targeted area of complexity achieved significant improvement:

Business Processes

• ProLink’s Framework enabled robust alerts, auditable records, checklists, compliance, reporting, and workflow functionality
• ProLink SmartDox technology was implemented to organize and centralize all processes and related documents into one unified system
• The intuitive system simplifies users’ processes, increasing productivity, accuracy, and profitability

Compliance

• New ability to meet and exceed State and Federal requirements on schedule with 100% auditable records now available
• Confidence in passing internal and external audits

Reporting

• The ability to quickly generate accurate, preconfigured, and ad hoc reports from diverse and numerous sources was achieved
• User adoption soared due to quantum leaps in efficiency and productivity

The Results

The solid success for this large bank was accomplished by improving and streamlining their complex processes – and attractive byproducts were also created. Our client discovered that they became empowered to work proactively rather than reactively throughout deal cycles. They could also focus on other lines of business and new initiatives, rather than constantly attending to identified problems within their processes. Their profitability has increased because deal creation, workflow and speed-to-decision have all flourished as their ProLink Solution continues to provide unmatched performance, innovation and support.

 

Built on the proven ProLink Framework, our web-based tax credit investment solution can be uniquely tailored to satisfy your needs, allowing your focus to remain on promoting and providing community investments.