Speed doesn’t just make for a better broker experience — according to Jim Noel, VP of Partner Originations at Brightcap Financial, it often decides who wins the deal outright. In this conversation, Monitor Editor-in-Chief Rita Garwood talks with Noel about where friction actually creeps into the process on both the broker and funder side, why trust determines which exception requests get approved, how brokers and funders should be communicating with each other, and where AI is already reshaping underwriting, fraud prevention, and training. They close with Noel’s vision for where broker-funder relationships are headed — including funding a deal in as little as fifteen minutes.
Watch the full podcast below or listen on Spotify.
Rita Garwood: Welcome to the Monitor Podcast. I’m Rita Garwood, editor-in-chief of Monitor. Joining me on the podcast today is Jim Noel. Jim is VP of Partner Originations at Brightcap Financial. Jim, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for being here today.
Jim Noel: Rita, greatly appreciate it. Excited to be on the podcast and have a great conversation.
Garwood: Today we’re going to be talking about creating a better partner experience and reducing friction from the first conversation to a funded deal. First, I want to touch on how to reduce friction. When funders and brokers talk about friction in the deal process, what does that actually mean in practice, and where does most of it come from?
Noel: Friction is a topic for both funders and brokers. I’d define friction as an obstacle in the deal life cycle that can cause a transaction to slow down, stall, or fail. It can occur at any stage in the process, from application intake and underwriting all the way through to the funding stage.
Friction really does occur on both sides. Early in the process, it tends to be more broker-related, and that comes from application intake — an application that’s incomplete or has inaccurate information, or is missing documentation like the bank statements needed to underwrite the deal. We’ve even seen bank statements come in mislabeled. Those are three things that can slow the process down early, because now the funder has to go back to the broker for additional information.
But there’s also a good amount of friction on the funder side, and some of that comes down to policies and procedures. There are funding sources that do very minimal upfront credit underwriting and put out a soft offer, with the goal of doing most of the underwriting on the back end, once the merchant has signed documents and the deal is ready to fund. That can cause a lot of issues if the funder uncovers problems late — the offer might get reduced, the term might get reduced, or worst case, the deal dies altogether. At Brightcap, we’ve tried to eliminate that. We’re focused on doing as much underwriting up front as possible, so we can put out a firmer offer and reduce friction on the back end.
When friction causes a deal to die or the terms to change, it’s a terrible experience for both the broker and the merchant. That merchant has already signed documents, expecting the funds they need to grow their business, and now the deal has changed. So as a funding source, anything we can do to constantly reduce that friction has a positive outcome on the relationship with the broker — and an even more positive outcome for the broker’s relationship with their merchant.
Garwood: That makes a lot of sense. Friction, of course, reduces speed of service. How much does speed actually decide who wins a deal when a merchant may be shopping with multiple brokers or funders at the same time? And what separates a fast process from a slow one across the industry?
Noel: You’re spot on — speed is critical. In this day and age, merchants can easily search online to find financing companies, so a lot of times they’re engaged with more than one broker. I can’t tell you how many applications we receive from a merchant through multiple broker sources. So speed, and getting that offer back to your broker partner, is critical, because very often the first one who gets back to the merchant with a viable solution is going to win the deal.
Some of the important things that go into speed of service, particularly in delivering that offer, start with how the broker is submitting applications to the funding source. There are really three ways a broker can submit deals. The first is API integration, which is the fastest and most efficient way for applications to get into a funder’s system, particularly with a two-way API — applications come directly from the broker’s system into our credit underwriting, and we can deliver the offer right back into their system, which makes the whole process a lot faster.
Not every broker has API capability, though, so you want to give them alternative options that are still timely. A lot of funders will have a portal where a broker can submit all the application information and upload the bank statements, and as soon as they hit submit, it goes into credit underwriting. That’s still fast, but it does slow things down slightly, since someone has to manually log in and submit the application. The third way — and a lot of brokers still love this — is submitting applications the old-fashioned way, via email. Historically, that’s been the slowest method, because you need a manual app-entry team to grab the email, review the information, code it into the system, and upload the bank statements.
We just launched an AI platform that changes that. When an application comes in via email, our AI platform scrapes it for all the necessary information, enters it into our system, and uploads the bank statements — so those email applications are getting entered almost simultaneously now. Ultimately, the method a broker uses to submit, and how quickly the funder can process it, determines how fast it gets into the credit underwriting queue, how quickly the offer gets back to the broker, and whether they’re the first one back in touch with the merchant.
Garwood: You’re talking about different brokers and the way they submit applications, but there’s other communication that goes on between funders and brokers, and brokers clearly have different preferences for how they want to be reached. Is there an emerging best practice for how funders should handle that, or is it still pretty ad hoc across the industry from what you’re seeing?
Noel: That’s an interesting topic. A lot of brokers like to be communicated with differently, and today there are many more ways to do that — communication platforms like Slack, email, text messages, and the good old phone call. One broker may prefer one or multiple of those, and another broker may have a completely different preference.
As a funder, I think the key is first knowing how the broker wants to be communicated with, and then making sure your organization communicates that way. If a broker says they want to be reached via Slack and you keep emailing them instead, and they don’t monitor their email as closely as Slack, it’s going to hurt your chances of winning deals. So a funder has to adapt to the broker’s preferred method, rather than trying to get the broker to conform to yours.
Once you’ve got that right, the second part is effective communication — the actual messaging. It should be clear, concise, and action-oriented. Brokers don’t want a five-paragraph message from you; they want the nuts and bolts, so they know exactly what steps they need to take to get back to you in a timely fashion. So for me, communication isn’t just about the mechanism — it’s also about how you deliver the message.
Garwood: That makes sense — and some people are naturally better communicators than others. Would you have advice for someone who might be prone to writing a five-paragraph email? How can they become more effective communicators?
Noel: Some of it comes with practice, and some with self-education. I’ll say this: use AI to help craft your messages. If you’ve written a long email that you feel gets your point across, run it through AI and see if it can make the message more concise — not all of us were English majors.
Beyond that, brokers will often tell you if you’re too long-winded — they’ll say, ‘do me a favor, keep it shorter and more to the point.’ So I think it’s a combination of using the tools available to you, learning from colleagues who do a great job communicating with their broker partners, and making sure you’re delivering the right message concisely and clearly.
Garwood: Great advice — and as a journalism and English major myself, I’d advise everyone not to bury the lead. Put the main point right at the top so people can get it right away.
Noel: That’s a great point. And another interesting thing is, when you’re communicating in written form, don’t use all caps. Sometimes when someone reads a message — whether it’s an email, a text, or a Slack — they can’t pick up on your tone or your urgency, so you have to make sure your message is crafted in a way that delivers the right tone. I remember when email first started, if you got a message in all capital letters, that meant somebody was yelling at you. Those little things matter — making sure the message is not just clear and concise, but also that the tone will be well received on the broker’s side, and vice versa.
Garwood: Great advice. I want to circle back to AI and APIs, which you’ve already mentioned a couple times. They’re really changing how applications get submitted and processed. What’s the real impact on turnaround time and deal quality across the space, and where is the hype ahead of the reality?
Noel: It’s interesting — I remember just a couple of years ago, AI was still in its infancy, and none of us really knew where it was going to go or the impact it would have on our daily and business lives. It’s come such a long way since then, and it seems to get a little better every day.
I think AI is a very valuable tool that both funders and brokers can use throughout the entire deal process. We talked earlier about using AI on email submissions to get applications into the credit underwriting queue faster. But credit teams can also use AI to review a lot more data, much more easily than before, instead of manually reviewing a stack of different reports. AI can summarize the underwriting package for a merchant, so the underwriter can focus more on the decision instead of on the data itself.
I’m also excited about how AI can help with fraud prevention. Fraud is prevalent in our industry — I’ve been in this space for almost 30 years, and no matter where I’ve been, fraud always creeps up. Every fraudulent deal means putting money out on the street and getting nothing back, and it hurts both the funder and the broker. I think AI is going to be a big tool for identifying fraudulent bank statements, improving identity verification, and flagging unusual transaction activity.
On the broker side, I’ve had a lot of conversations about AI utilization. I have one broker who’s completely built their new-hire training around AI — when a new employee starts, they go entirely through AI-based training, so the broker doesn’t have to pull a successful rep off the floor to train someone new. AI is also being used to monitor call activity, to make sure reps are saying the right things on calls with merchants. I think it’s an exciting technology, and it’s already done great things for the industry — I’m excited to see where it goes in the coming months and years.
Garwood: Agreed, definitely. With AI, your output is generally only as good as the data you’re feeding into it, and data quality can be an issue. With self-reported information versus verified credit, there’s often a gap. How does that affect trust between brokers and funders, and what should brokers do differently about data like that?
Noel: That’s a tough question. As much as we’d love a broker to pull credit on every deal to verify what the merchant says — because I can’t tell you how many times a merchant claims a 700 FICO and it turns out to be a 595 — that costs brokers money, and they’re always focused on reducing their cost of acquisition.
So they’re often using self-reported information from the merchant, and as a funder, as long as the broker tells us that up front, we’re okay with it. If they tell us they pulled credit and what they report is dramatically different from what we find, that becomes an issue worth a conversation. But self-reported information isn’t as impactful for us because a lot of our initial underwriting is platform-driven up front. If we have a minimum FICO score we’re looking for and the merchant claims to be above it, but our own credit pull shows they’re below it, we kick that deal out immediately — so we’re not investing an underwriter’s time on it.
As much as we’d love brokers to run tools like Ocrolus or MoneyThumb on bank statements, because that would give us a much better match, at the end of the day they’re focused on their bottom line. So we’re okay with self-reported data, as long as it’s clearly labeled as such.
Garwood: Let’s shift to talking about industry pain points. What’s the most common complaint brokers have about funders right now? Is it consistency, communication, something else?
Noel: I think consistency is a big one. Brokers tend to have the best results with funding sources they know well, where they understand the process from start to finish. As a funder, if you’re consistent on every deal, the broker comes to expect that consistency, and they can have a better conversation with the merchant about what’s needed to get a deal funded.
Consistency goes hand in hand with predictability — delivering that same level of service over and over. And as we talked about earlier, communication is a key driver of broker satisfaction. If you’re consistent in your product and program delivery, consistent in your process from start to finish, and consistent in your messaging, those are the things that build a strong relationship between a funder and a broker. Trust is critical — if a broker trusts your process and your service levels, both organizations win. If they don’t, that’s where the pain comes from.
Garwood: That makes a lot of sense. Trust is so important, and knowing what to expect is essential.
Noel: That’s not to say curveballs won’t happen from time to time. We’ve all had deals that looked great, were flying through the system, and then something happened. Those situations will always arise, and I think brokers understand that. But if you’re consistent 90% of the time, brokers tend to be understanding of the oddball scenarios.
Garwood: Let’s talk about that for a minute — deals falling apart later in the game. Why do you think deals often collapse right before funding, and what separates funders who prevent that from those who don’t?
Noel: As we talked about earlier, I think some of it comes down to the funding source’s process. Funders who do the majority of their underwriting on the back end are going to see more friction there — if you’re doing soft underwriting and putting out soft offers up front, that sets you up for issues when the full underwriting happens at the final stage. Really, almost every topic we’ve talked about — communication, consistency — comes back into play here.
Second, sometimes deals falling apart is unavoidable. There are funders who are first-position lenders, so they pull month-to-date bank statements to make sure the merchant hasn’t taken out additional funding during the current month — and if they have, that can kill the deal. So sometimes a deal dying at the back end just isn’t avoidable.
For me, it really comes down to making sure that as a funder, you’re consistent in your approach, and your process is fully outlined so both the broker and the merchant understand what to expect. When a deal does die, if you’ve been consistent, the broker will understand. Funders don’t want deals to die on the back end — we’re in business to put loans out on the street and make money — but at the same time, we want to make sure the deals we’re putting on the books are the right ones.
Garwood: That makes a lot of sense. We talked about having a standard process and knowing what to expect, but there are exceptions in some cases. When is it reasonable for a broker to ask for an exception, and how should a healthy funder-broker relationship handle requests like that?
Noel: A lot of funders welcome exception requests from brokers, within reason. If you’ve put out a 12-month offer and the broker comes back asking for 24 months, that’s probably not reasonable. So first, the request should be reasonable — if you’re approved for $100,000 and someone comes back asking for $400,000, that’s probably not a reasonable ask either.
When a broker is asking for an exception, the more information they can provide, the better. If they’re looking for more money, tell us why the merchant needs it — a specific use of proceeds — or provide additional information that can help strengthen the deal. I have a number of brokers who, when they come back for an exception on term or dollar amount, bring additional information with them — maybe a contract their merchant recently signed that will bring in additional revenue, or other color on the deal. That helps us in sales go back to credit with a stronger case for why the exception should be granted.
So we welcome exception requests, as long as they’re reasonable and not happening on every deal. The other important part: I can’t tell you how many times a broker has said, ‘if you can get me this, we’ll close the deal,’ and then you get them what they need and the deal doesn’t close — and you find out it closed with someone else. That goes back to trust. My credit department is fully aware of which broker partners we’ve put exception requests in for, and they know that when partner A asks for an exception and we grant it, that deal tends to fund and perform. When partner B asks and we grant it, very little of it actually funds. So credit naturally leans toward doing more for partner A, because there’s a higher probability that deal will actually fund with us. It goes back to that trust component — if you’re trusting the broker’s ask to help close the deal, that trust tends to get you more done over time.
Garwood: You have that true kind of partnership between the broker and the funder in that situation. We talk about partnerships a lot, and I want to explore what that word actually means to you when it comes to brokers and funders. It gets used pretty loosely — everyone uses it all the time. What actually distinguishes a broker-funder relationship that works well from one that’s purely transactional?
Noel: You really hit the nail on the head — I think the word ‘partnership’ is used very loosely in this marketplace. For me, being a partner first and foremost means understanding who the broker is, what’s important to them, where they’ve been as an organization, where they are now, and where they want to go. A successful relationship between a funder and a broker needs to be mutually beneficial for both sides.
The more a funder can understand about a broker — what makes them tick, what’s important to them, how they drive leads in the door — the better we can deliver the products and programs that help that partner succeed. It’s also about supporting them, like training new employees on your process as a funder and making sure they’re fully up to speed. And, as we talked about, being consistent builds trust between both organizations. When you, as a funder, prioritize the best outcome for the broker and the merchant over what’s simply good for the funder, that’s where you start building real relationships — and when brokers see that you’re there to help them grow, that’s where those business bonds form and communication gets better.
So for me, I take that word seriously. Everyone says ‘I want to be your partner,’ but actually doing the things it takes to be a successful partner is different — it’s one thing to say here’s everything we can do for you, but when you actually deliver on it, that’s where you build trust. That’s where you build a stronger partnership between both organizations.
Garwood: We’re almost out of time, but I have one last question for you. In all of our conversation today about brokers and funders and their relationships, where do you think this is all going to evolve over the next few years? Things seem to be changing rapidly every day, as you’ve mentioned several times, with technology and just the state of the world in general. Where do you expect to see broker-funder relationships a few years from now?
Noel: As AI continues to develop, I think you’ll see brokers look to narrow the number of funders they work with to a more targeted group, rather than a much bigger pool — particularly as AI helps brokers better identify which deal should go where. So I think you’ll see strengthened relationships between funders and brokers.
We talked about speed of service, and I think AI is going to keep pushing that forward. Organizationally, our long-term vision is to have a deal go from application submitted to funding in fifteen minutes — almost like when you walk into a furniture store, and within ten minutes you’re signing and walking out with a new dining room set. As both funders and brokers continue to adapt with AI, I think the overall process is going to get better, communication will strengthen between organizations, and speed of service is going to become even more important. Merchants are going to have a lot of options available to them, and the brokers and funders that can deliver a solution that meets the merchant’s needs quickly are the ones that will win those deals — and survive and thrive over the next few years and beyond.
Garwood: That makes a lot of sense. You’re becoming more like the consumer finance realm, for sure. Well, Jim, thank you so much for being on the podcast today and having this conversation. I really enjoyed spending this time with you and learning more about brokers and funders and how you see everything.
Noel: Rita, greatly appreciate it. It was a lot of fun, and thank you very much for considering me. I’d love to do it again.
