AMP Bank recently began onboarding brokers to its new AMP Bank Lender Platform, marking a major milestone in the lender’s drive to deliver faster, simpler and more consistent lending experiences. We sit down with the bank’s head of lending origination, Melissa Christy, and head of lending and everyday banking distribution, Paul Herbert, to discover what the new system entails.
Q: You began onboarding accredited brokers for the new system on 14 August following a broker pilot. For brokers who haven’t seen it yet, can you explain what the new origination system actually does?
Melissa Christy: It’s really about streamlining the whole lodgement and assessment process. The system verifies as much information as possible up front — things like income, ID, expenses — before the broker even hits submit. That means there’s far less back-and-forth, brokers know exactly where they stand, and customers get a much faster, more transparent experience.
Paul Herbert: From my perspective, it’s about putting more of the decisioning power in the broker’s hands. Instead of waiting days for a credit assessor to check documents, a lot of that happens instantly in the system. The result is faster turnaround times, fewer surprises, and brokers looking like absolute rock stars in front of their clients.
Q: What sets this platform apart from others?
Paul Herbert: We started from a clean slate, purposely stopping our old approach rather than iterating on it. We’ve brought decisioning much closer to the broker, reducing duplication and multiple system use.
Melissa Christy: It’s the only digital automated solution verifying everything up front before submission, giving brokers full visibility of their position before they submit — often without needing any documents at all.
Q: Why build your own rather than take something off-the-shelf?
Melissa Christy: We wanted to design a market-leading experience for brokers and their customers, and there wasn’t an off-the-shelf solution to do that. Our philosophy is to reuse what brokers already do up front, so customers never have to do something twice. We also verify as much as possible before submission, so brokers have a very good idea of approval likelihood before they submit.
The main goal was to improve turnaround times — getting unconditional approval emails out instantly, loan docs in 90 seconds, and better educating customers with a two-minute video. Most decisioning rules now run up front so assessors focus only on exceptions.
Paul Herbert: We trust our brokers — they operate under best-interest duty and deliver incredible value to customers. The only part of the process they don’t control is after they submit to a lender. We wanted to give brokers more confidence and make them look like the champion in their customer’s eyes by ensuring the experience we deliver matches the service promises they’ve made.
Q: How did the build process unfold?
Melissa Christy: The project really started at the beginning of 2023. We reviewed the market, narrowed down options, ran an RFP [request for proposal], and found a provider flexible enough for our customisation needs. We began building in early 2024, piloted internally in October, then started a broker pilot in May this year, gradually adding more brokers as we went.
Q: What did you learn from the broker pilot?
Melissa Christy: Brokers used it differently from our internal testers, so we discovered fields that shouldn’t be mandatory or functions that needed tweaking. One highlight was income verification: a broker declared income, ran the digital service, and the difference was just 28 cents. That figure didn’t need to be looked at by a credit assessor — it was already verified.
Paul Herbert: Even though brokers were involved from the start, it’s only when you open to a wider group with different business models that you uncover those 1 per cent improvements. The pilot stage was about finding those and making changes before the next iteration.
Q: What about complex deals — can the platform handle them?
Melissa Christy: Yes. We cater for guarantors, companies, trusts, construction, self-employed and PAYG. PAYG will always be faster, but we also have income verification for self-employed using scanned tax returns and NOAs.
Q: Can you share a standout success story from the pilot?
Melissa Christy: One of the first broker deals had digital income verified perfectly. The broker’s client then immediately left a five-star rating straight away on his website and he was like: ‘Oh my God, look what you've done for me and my customer’.
Q: How does the income verification work?
Melissa Christy: We use two providers. Equifax’s Verification Exchange connects to payroll providers — about 30 per cent of the market — to pull in detailed income history. Fortiro scans payslips, tax returns and NOAs, calculating income and checking documents for fraud.
Q: Does the platform reflect the day-to-day broker workflow?
Melissa Christy: Yes. For example, brokers can reuse a Verification of Identity done earlier via IDVerse. We consume that and run any additional checks needed — no double-handling.
Q: If a broker wants to start using it, how do they get access?
Paul Herbert: No new accreditation is needed. Now that it’s live for all broker partners, they can choose the new LoanApp button in their lodgement process. We’ll eventually switch off the old system, but for now brokers can try it alongside their existing process.
Tune in to hear more!
You can find out more about AMP Bank’s new lending origination platform for brokers in The Adviser’s In Focus podcast, here:
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