Nivo report highlights hidden cost of admin rework in asset finance

Nivo has published a new market insights report revealing the scale of administrative inefficiencies across the specialist and asset finance market, with lenders and brokers losing hours on every case due to incomplete submissions, repeated document requests and manual follow-up work.

The report, The Rework Problem, draws on conversations with more than 70 lenders and brokers across the UK specialist lending market, alongside deployment data from Nivo’s AI platform. The findings point to a persistent issue across origination processes: too much time is being spent gathering, checking and chasing information that should have been submitted correctly the first time.

According to the research, most firms surveyed reported right-first-time submission rates of 50% or below. As a result, a significant proportion of daily operational activity is focused on correcting incomplete information, requesting missing documentation, clarifying requirements and rebuilding case packs before applications can progress.

For asset finance providers, the challenge is amplified by the number of parties involved in completing transactions. Brokers, customers, suppliers, sales teams, credit teams and payout teams all need to move quickly and in sync, with repeated requests for bank statements, proofs of income, ID documentation, invoices and asset information often slowing the process.

Nivo’s findings show that a typical specialist lending or asset finance case can generate between 15 and 20 message exchanges, involve more than five people and require in excess of five hours of administration on the broker-to-lender leg alone. The report also found that between 20% and 50% of cases stall or fail to complete, with process friction frequently proving a greater obstacle than the quality of the underlying deal itself.

The company said the findings highlight an opportunity for lenders and brokers to intervene earlier in the process. Nivo’s AI agents operate over email around the clock to gather information and documentation, validate submissions, chase missing items and help package completed cases for review.

In early deployments, Nivo said AI agents introduced at intake and document collection stages have reduced administration time by between six and eight hours per case.

Commenting on the findings, Matthew Elliott, co-founder and chief commercial officer at Nivo, said: “The biggest thing stopping brokers and lenders completing more deals is the admin work gathering, checking, and chasing information and documents.

“Our AI agents are a perfect fit for this work, taking it on 24/7 so teams can move more cases forward faster at lower cost.”

The Rework Problem report is available to download from Nivo’s whitepaper site.