When a community bank closes a mortgage loan, the work isn't finished. Every data field from the loan origination system needs to reach the core banking platform for servicing. Borrower names, interest rates, escrow details, payment schedules. At banks still running disconnected systems, staff type every field by hand from one screen to another. One bank estimated a 1-5% error rate on manual re-entry, with each mistake triggering a correction cycle that delayed loan boarding by days.
For community banks competing with national lenders on speed and accuracy, that post-closing bottleneck is a strategic liability. Borrowers notice when their new mortgage doesn't appear in online banking on time. Examiners notice when origination records don't match servicing records. And staff notice when their days are consumed by clerical re-keying instead of serving customers.
The core challenge is straightforward: loan origination systems (LOS) and core banking platforms were not built to talk to each other natively. A community bank running Empower for origination and Finastra Fusion Phoenix for core banking has two independent data stores that need to share loan information at the moment of closing.
Without automation, the process looks like this:
This process is expensive, slow, and error-prone. For a bank handling hundreds of mortgage closings per month, it consumes significant staff hours and introduces compliance risk at every keystroke.
First Citizens Bank is a family-owned community bank headquartered in Mason City, Iowa, with eight locations across North Iowa and Minnesota. With over $1.8 billion in assets and more than 200 employees, First Citizens has the scale to invest in technology while maintaining the personal service of a locally owned institution.
The bank has partnered with Finastra for nearly 30 years to power its core operations. In 2023, First Citizens migrated Finastra's Fusion Phoenix to the cloud on Microsoft Azure, gaining faster access to platform updates and reducing on-premises infrastructure costs. On the lending side, the bank uses Empower LOS from Dark Matter Technologies for mortgage origination.
Despite advanced platforms on both sides, the systems historically lacked a native connection. Loan data did not flow automatically from Empower to Phoenix. Every closed loan required manual re-entry, the same bottleneck that thousands of community banks face nationwide.
The solution isn't building a custom point-to-point connector. It's implementing a managed integration layer that sits between the LOS and core platform with business rules, validation logic, and continuous monitoring.
The data flow after automation:
For First Citizens Bank, this eliminated 100% of manual re-entry for post-closing loan boarding. Loans that took hours to board now complete in minutes. Staff time shifts from clerical data entry to customer service and exception handling.
Eliminating manual re-entry is the obvious win. The downstream benefits matter more to leadership:
When origination and servicing records are populated from the same automated data source, they match. Regulatory reports pulling from core banking align with origination records. FFIEC examiners and OCC reviewers see consistent data across systems. The audit trail from the integration layer provides documentation that manual processes can't.
For community banks under federal examination, data consistency between systems isn't optional. It's a regulatory expectation.
Borrowers expect their new mortgage to appear in online banking promptly after closing. Automated loan boarding delivers that experience. Welcome letters, payment schedules, and online account access happen on time because the data arrived in the servicing platform immediately, not days later after manual processing.
For community banks competing against national lenders with fully digital experiences, post-closing speed is a retention factor. A smooth onboarding experience validates the borrower's choice to work with a community institution.
Manual re-entry doesn't scale. When loan volume increases during refinance booms or purchase season, the only option is overtime or temporary staff. An automated integration handles increased volume without additional headcount. The same pipeline that processes 50 closings per month handles 200 without configuration changes.
For community banks planning growth through acquisition or expanded lending programs, integration scalability is infrastructure. It needs to be in place before volume increases, not retrofitted under pressure.
Every data transfer between origination and servicing systems carries sensitive borrower information: Social Security numbers, financial details, property information. The integration layer must enforce security controls at the same level as the systems it connects.
A managed IT partner handles integration security as part of the overall environment rather than as a separate vendor-maintained connection. Security controls, monitoring, and incident response cover the integration layer alongside endpoints, cloud tenants, and network infrastructure.
Community banks evaluating LOS-to-core integration have three options, ranging from least to most mature:
ABT serves 750+ financial institutions and provides managed IT services that include system integration across core banking, lending, and cloud platforms. The managed approach means your integration security, monitoring, and maintenance are part of the same relationship that handles your Microsoft 365 tenant, endpoint security, and compliance documentation.
Talk to an ABT specialist about managed IT services for community banks, including LOS-to-core integration, Microsoft 365 licensing, and security monitoring. Or get a free Security Assessment to see where your current technology stack stands.
Manual re-entry of loan data from origination systems to core banking platforms introduces a 1-5% error rate, delays loan boarding by hours or days, and creates data inconsistencies that complicate regulatory reporting and FFIEC examinations. Automated integration eliminates re-keying entirely, boards loans in minutes, and provides audit trails documenting every data transfer between systems.
Disconnected systems produce data inconsistencies between origination records and servicing records. Regulatory reports pulling from different systems may not reconcile. FFIEC examiners and OCC reviewers checking loan data across platforms will find discrepancies that manual processes introduce. Automated, validated integrations ensure data consistency and create documentation of every transfer for audit purposes.
LOS-to-core integrations carry sensitive borrower information and must include encryption in transit using TLS 1.2 or higher, encryption at rest, mutual authentication between both systems, dedicated service accounts with minimum necessary permissions, rules-based data validation, and continuous monitoring of connection health and error rates. Security controls should match or exceed those of the systems being connected.
Vendor-maintained middleware is managed by one side of the integration with limited visibility into the other side. When either vendor releases an update, the middleware may lag months behind. A managed IT partner coordinates updates proactively across both systems, monitors integration health alongside the rest of your infrastructure, and provides a single escalation path for any issue.
Automated LOS-to-core integration processes increased loan volume without additional headcount. The same integration pipeline handling 50 closings per month handles 200 without configuration changes. Community banks planning growth through acquisition or expanded lending programs need integration scalability in place before volume increases rather than retrofitting manual processes under pressure.