As your business starts growing, you reach a point where you are taking care of everything. You will find it difficult to keep up with everything because your time is limited. You will not be able to focus on your core business activity which will eventually hinder the growth of your business. This is where getting a Virtual Assistant Service can make an impact on your business. Virtual assistant service will offer you more time to focus on what matters most for your business. Hence, this article is about the daily activities performed by the virtual assistant who is working to help your business operations run smoothly. As you read on, you will come to know who is a virtual assistant and the benefits of signing up for virtual assistant service.
What is Virtual Assistant?
As the name suggests, a virtual assistant is someone who assists you in daily tasks but virtually. According to Wikipedia, a professional virtual assistant or a virtual office assistant is someone who provides professional, technical, administrative, or creative assistance to clients by staying at their own home or office. It means the virtual assistant can work from the other side of the city or even another side of the world.
Why Virtual Assistant Service?
Virtual assistant service is especially in demand by entrepreneurs and e-businesses. Businesses usually hire virtual assistant service for specific tasks such as digital marketing, social media management, accounting, content writing, web designing, loan processing, appointment-scheduling etc. Virtual assistant service is important for entrepreneurs because it is impossible to do everything themselves.
Some virtual assistants specialise in specific tasks whereas others perform numerous tasks for a particular business sector. Using virtual assistant service frees up your time and lets you focus on your core business activity. It will also provide you cost benefits on physical office space and infrastructures. Virtual assistant service even offers you greater flexibility by allowing you to allocate your limited resources efficiently.
How to Hire a Virtual Assistant For Your Business?
You can ask your connections for referrals to find a Virtual Assistant or hire Virtual assistant service from websites such as Upwork & Fiverr. There is also an option of hiring companies in Upwork to hire a virtual assistant by signing up for their virtual assistant service. Many virtual assistant service provider has own website where you can hire their Virtual Assistant Service.
Among various industries, hiring Virtual Assistant Service is also popular among the mortgage brokers. A Virtual Assistant assists the broker starting from submitting a loan application to settlement and even to post-settlement. The broker can focus on generating leads while the virtual assistant manages the back office tasks. Various companies and individuals offer Virtual Assistant Service to the Mortgage Brokers. Likewise, Outsolu Nepal is one of the leading companies specialising in virtual assistant service for Australian mortgage brokers.
About Outsolu Nepal
Outsolu Nepal provides best virtual assistant service for mortgage brokers in Australia. The virtual assistants in Outsolu Nepal are a team of highly trained and dedicated individuals working under expert team leaders. Outsolu Nepal provides file-based as well as full time virtual assistant service. Our Per Application virtual assistant service has four different types of service, i.e. Pre-lodgement, Lodgement, Full Service & Post Settlement. Our virtual assistant pricing is one of the best pricing in the industry. Our dedicated virtual assistant has experience working in various scenarios of loans and CRM such as Fleats, Mercury, Podium etc.
Daily Schedule
You might be thinking how the broker delegates tasks to the virtual assistant. The broker can assign the task to the virtual assistant through email or chat. An email account is set up for assistant under broker’s company name. Broker also provides CRM login details and access to client’s supporting documents and broker code.
Once everything is set up, the broker sends fact find and supporting documents. Broker forwards any backchannel notification from the bank to the assistant for which action should be taken. This way assistant will be updated and take action to follow up if required. Virtual Assistant reports back to the broker once the task is completed.
Are you still wondering about how this virtual assistant service works and whether if this is your cup of tea? A little insight into a day of Virtual business assistant for Australian Mortgage broker might help you decide. There is no typical day for Virtual Assistant, but here is a general outline of what I might do in a particular day.
The day for a Virtual Assistant at Outsolu Nepal starts at 7 AM which is 11:15 AM in Australia. Starting your work early in the morning in summer is easy. However, as winter begins, the weather in Kathmandu is cold and chilly. It starts getting a bit of a hassle. Moreover, due to daylight saving in winter, we need to reach office by 6 AM. However, our work is what keeps us motivated to get up early in those chilly mornings and reach office on time.
Monday
Today is Monday, which is the most hectic day of the week. I hardly find any moment to spare. Usually, I check my emails at home before leaving for office, so that I can make up my mind on which task to prioritize. Before I look into other tasks for the day, I deal with any sensitive and urgent file. For today, I have one application whose finance due date expires. The first thing I did when I reached the office was I followed up with the lender as we needed the formal approval by today. However, the assessment team had not completed assessment yet. I emailed the client Solicitor to extend the Finance due date if possible.
After the email, I continued following up with other files. I report back to the broker and take required actions at the same time. I was put on hold for 1 hour as usual by ANZ. To utilize that time, I order pricing, index the documents and complete data entry in CRM. If it is not urgent, the Virtual Assistants at Outsolu usually follow up with other lenders before ANZ. The follow up is not only limited to lenders, but virtual assistants also follow up with the client, client’s solicitor, lender’s paralegal team, builder or any related party.
In the case of Macquarie, Legal Stream is the paralegal team. Till the loan is formally approved, we follow up with the Macquarie Bank. Once we get the formal approval, we then follow up with Legal Stream. The paralegal team for Macquarie is different for different states. Now, for example, if the property is in Victoria or Queensland, MSA National is the paralegal team for that particular state.
Lunch Time
I went to lunch at 12:30 on this day. Usually, I have my lunch at between 12 to 1 PM. Before I leave my desk to eat, I check if I have any calls to make to the lenders. Most of the banks in Australia closes when I come back from lunch due to 4 hrs time difference between Australia and Nepal. The time difference is around 5 hrs during winter due to daylight saving.
After I came back from lunch, I completed Fleats data entry and Apply online for a Purchase application. Then I requested missing supporting documents from the client. If all goes well, this application might be submitted tomorrow. I manage workflow tasks on Fleats and Mercury and also recheck my follow up sheet, before winding down for the day. Apart from providing virtual assistance service, I also do content writing for Outsolu Nepal or the broker. As today was a busy day, I left content writing for the next day.
Tuesday
Tuesday is comparatively a less busy day than Monday. As usual, I checked my emails before leaving for office. After reaching the office, the first thing I did was to follow up with the lender for formal approval. We received the formal approval before the finance due date expired. I emailed the Client and client’s solicitor regarding the Formal approval. Before emailing the Formal Approval document to the client, the virtual assistant always needs to confirm all the information in the approval is correct. The reason for confirming at this stage is the same information will be included in the loan offer documents. If it’s not correct, the virtual assistant should notify the lender beforehand.
I followed up with various lenders and their paralegal team regarding different stages of the loan. Next, I submitted a purchase application to NAB. An email was also sent to the client informing submission of the loan. I generally inform the clients through calls or emails on every milestone of their loan progress. While I was on call, I received the missing documents I requested fro the client. I renamed the documents and updated Mercury and apply online with new information.
Tuesday was similar to Monday, but yes the workload was little less than yesterday. I found time to write content today. I managed the workflow in CRM and rechecked and updated my follow up sheet.
Wednesday
Wednesday is a more or less similar day to Tuesday. I have two files settling today. I followed up with the lender regarding the settlement. After confirming the loan has settled, I informed the client through email regarding the settlement. We sometimes inform the clients through calls as well.
ANZ has issued Loan Offer Documents for another client today. Generally, I first call the lender and confirm if they have emailed the loan documents or sent them through the standard or express post. After establishing the details are correct, I sent an email to the client to notify their loan offer documents will be delivered in a couple of days. The loan offer documents have been express posted. I have also advised the tracking number to the client so that they can track it down. I usually follow up with the client after a couple of days to confirm receipt of loan documents. If the documents are taking more than average time for delivery, I follow up with Auspost. Sometimes the documents get misplaced and may not be delivered on time.
Usually, I complete my loan processing tasks around 2 to 3 PM. I allocate my remaining time to write content for the blog. Before I leave I update the follow-up task on the CRM and follow up sheet.
Thursday
There is usually less work load on Thursday. When I checked the emails before leaving for office, there were only a few. After reaching the office, I made a few follow-ups with clients and lenders. I also sent emails to the broker, customer, and solicitor as required. Then, I tracked the Loan Documents issued by ANZ on Aus Post and found out that the documents have delivered. I emailed the client to confirm if they have received the documents. The clients confirmed that they received the loan documents. However, the client is not sure how to complete the Loan Offer Documents.
Each lender has different forms to fill up and different requirements. Also, the information to be filled on the Loan documents are very crucial, so I called up the lender and asked how to complete the loan documents. Now, my job is to make the client understand the whole process. What could be better than sending screenshots of every step so that the client can clearly understand how to complete the form. Hence I do the same.
Friday
The last day of the week Friday is the most relaxing day. I continue with checking my emails and following up with the urgent ones. Due to a low number of tasks today, I can contribute much time to content writing and finish writing the blog.
Just when I thought today was an easy day, the broker sent me an urgent file that required data entry on CRM along with ordering valuation. I completed valuation before lunch; however, data entry took me longer than I anticipated. Today lunch break was short for me. I quickly finished eating and then resumed my data entry task. At around 1 PM, I finished my task just giving me enough time to continue and complete my blog.
Fridays are for weekly team meetings at Outsolu. We do have a small meeting at the end of each day. However, on Fridays, we don’t have many tasks on our desk. We can afford enough time to discuss on problems of Virtual assistants faced during the week. At around 3 PM, our meeting commenced. I put forward the issue I encountered with broker support of various lenders. There was a mild discussion on this topic, and we brainstormed different solutions. I suggested looking up at lender websites for better clarification about broker support. With this, we wrapped up the meeting. It was almost the end of the day, so I quickly updated task in my follow up sheet and workflow in CRM. These activities concluded my week. Now, I am looking forward to a great weekend.
Conclusion
The objective of writing this article is to show how Outsolu Nepal virtual assistant assists brokers to run their back-office tasks. By reading this article, you sure got to know that a dedicated virtual assistant’s work starts right from the moment the customer decides to apply for a loan through the broker. Here at Outsolu, Virtual Assistant handles work relating to CRM data entry, indexing documents, Apply Online, documents upload, valuation, pricing, compliance, lender followup, client follow up and settlement and post-settlement tasks. In other words, a dedicated virtual assistant supports the broker for the lifetime of a loan.
So if you are a mortgage broker in Australia and want to know more about the virtual assistant service, contact us at info@outsolu.com to connect with Outsolu Nepal. We guarantee to provide you with the best virtual assistant service.
Please include attribution to www.outsolu.com with this graphic.
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