Customer Success Story
SAFE Federal Credit Union Hits $725M in Loan Origination With MeridianLink’s Digital Lending Solutions
How SAFE Federal Credit Union Hit $725M in Loan Originations
Headquarters: Sumter, SC
Branch locations: 18
Members: 135,000+
Managed Assets: $1.7B
The Challenge
Reducing Manual Loan Processing, Modernizing The Member Experience
As one of the largest financial institutions in South Carolina, SAFE Federal Credit Union (SAFE FCU) offers accessible banking, retirement and investment options, auto loans, mortgages, personal loans, and much more to members across the Midlands area. Manual loan origination tasks, duplicate supporting documentation workflows, and disparate lending data were creating multiple bottlenecks throughout the origination process—slowing approval and funding times, leaving room for human error, and complicating member communications. Helping their members live their financial best through all stages of life required more efficient decision-making and modern ways to engage their community. The credit union needed a loan origination system that could consolidate all processes into a single location, simplify loan workflows, eliminate redundancies, and expand automated decisioning
The Solution
MeridianLink Consumer & Portal
Impressed with the digitally integrated, streamlined application experience, SAFE FCU implemented MeridianLink® Consumer and MeridianLink® Portal to simplify the application process, automate decisioning, and improve the member experience.
Why SAFE Federal Credit Union Selected MeridianLink Consumer & Portal
The ability to say “yes” 41,000+ times thanks to automated decisioning across all credit tiers.
Enhanced member experience via the reimagined online application portal and auto-booking capabilities.
Critical systems consolidated into one platform for a more efficient and effective origination process with integrated cross-sell capabilities.
The Results
More Pre-Approvals. More Delighted Members. Fewer Manual Processes.
After implementing MeridianLink Consumer and MeridianLink Portal, SAFE FCU experienced a groundbreaking 92% increase in loan applications. As a result, the credit union said “yes” 41,000 times in 2022, living up to their brand of “Family Helping Family.” SAFE FCU credits MeridianLink technology with its ability to enhance the member experience via auto-booking capabilities and turbocharge pre-approvals with quarterly, multi-product campaigns — all while reducing manual processes and redundancies in workflows. Leveraging MeridianLink’s dynamic campaign capabilities, SAFE FCU increased credit card production by 113%, grew its unsecured personal loan portfolio by approximately 64% ($40M), and increased auto vehicle loans by approximately 10% ($19.3M) in 2022. MeridianLink’s digital automation capabilities and robust marketplace of integration partners helped SAFE FCU streamline application processing, reduce the manual labor of printing and mailing loan notes, and connect with members of all ages by their preferred method of communication, including texting.
