The Challenge
Founded in 1846 and headquartered in Boston, Mass., Berkshire Bank has always maintained a strong focus on its customers and helping them reach their financial goals.
This passion for serving others has helped the bank grow and today, Berkshire manages approximately $12 billion in assets and serves communities across the greater New England area with more than 80 branch locations.
Named one of America’s Most Trusted Companies by Newsweek and one of America’s Best Regional Banks, Berkshire has built and maintained a strong reputation as a community and customer-focused organization, receiving a number of awards for its community-impact initiatives.
Berkshire Bank’s team takes pride in helping customers achieve their dreams, whether it’s building a home, saving for retirement, or starting a business. That’s why in 2000, the bank sought a way to modernize its lending tools and processes, especially for more complex business credit requests. This led Berkshire Bank to partner with Baker Hill over 20 years ago and since then, the partnership has expanded and continued to thrive, even during the most challenging times.
The Solution
Berkshire Bank first engaged Baker Hill in June of 2000, and after experiencing initial success with Baker Hill’s legacy solution, the bank chose to upgrade to the company’s web-based loan origination platform, Advisor. Berkshire’s success with Baker Hill’s early product suite and the company’s track record of providing excellent service led the bank to upgrade to the latest loan origination and risk management platform from Baker Hill: NextGen®. The bank also leveraged Baker Hill NextGen® to manage lending under the Paycheck Protection Program during and following the Covid-19 pandemic.
Today, Berkshire Bank uses Baker Hill NextGen® for small business lending, portfolio risk monitoring, including statement spreading and exception tracking, and more. Baker Hill NextGen® serves as a centralized platform to automate and streamline small business lending and portfolio monitoring for the bank, driving operational efficiencies while minimizing risk. With Baker Hill NextGen® and its integrated product modules, such as online loan applications, the Banker Application, and Client Portal, Berkshire has made the lending experience much easier and more efficient for both borrowers and for employees at the bank.
The bank’s business clients can now submit a loan request at any time of day via the online loan application and important documents can be submitted online through the Client Portal. For clients who prefer to work with a banker, the Baker Hill NextGen® Banker Application configures the loan application flows and information requirements for each product offering, so Berkshire Bank’s team members, can confidently guide clients and ensure a complete loan application is submitted every time.
Overall, the Baker Hill NextGen® suite has helped Berkshire Bank manage complex business credit requests in one system, which is leveraged by three lines of business within the bank. Baker Hill’s feature-rich LOS supports multiple decision strategies for business loan applications, based on the bank’s credit policies. The solution generates dynamic credit memos according to each loan’s complexity. For Berkshire Bank, this means opportunities can be analyzed quickly, consistently, and accurately.

The functionalities of Baker Hill NextGen® have helped the bank create efficiencies in manual processes, ditch the endless paper trails and automate certain workflows. For instance, Berkshire Bank is now able to auto-tag documents such as conditional approval letters and adverse action notices, to standardize and minimize errors during loan origination, protecting the bank from financial and reputational risk exposure. Additionally, once a loan is booked, Baker Hill NextGen® Portfolio Monitoring continuously analyzes borrower behavior across the entire portfolio with partner score data and automatically alerts Berkshire’s team when an account needs attention. Berkshire Bank’s team no longer must wait for traditional paperwork to show signs indicating a change in credit health. With Baker Hill, the bank can anticipate potential borrower challenges and take action to mitigate potential delinquencies and losses.
The partnership with Baker Hill has been overwhelmingly positive for Berkshire Bank and the bank appreciates the company’s visionary product roadmap. One of the biggest drivers of the bank’s satisfaction is Baker Hill’s commitment to ongoing product development and receptiveness to client feedback. In fact, most recently, Berkshire Bank closely collaborated with Baker Hill on the design of the company’s Paycheck Protection Program offering during the pandemic.
“Since we first partnered with Baker Hill more than two decades ago, banking as an industry has changed dramatically and we’ve had to evolve our lending processes to keep up,” said SVP, Credit Director of Berkshire Bank, Scott Gillanders. “Baker Hill’s team has proven to be a true partner, guiding us each step of the way through our digital transformation journey and even through a global pandemic. I joined the bank in 2016 and since then, I’ve witnessed first-hand how Baker Hill’s products provide added value and efficiency. We look forward to continuing our productive partnership together.”
The Results
Since partnering with Baker Hill more than 20 years ago and optimizing its lending workflows, Berkshire Bank has experienced notable growth. In 2000, the bank had just over $1 billion in assets.
Today, Berkshire Bank manages approximately $12 billion in assets and has seen a 10X increase in total loan production. For small business lending, the bank’s SBA (Small Business Administration) division shows an increase in loan volume every year from 2016 to 2022. Berkshire Bank’s consistent, sustained loan growth demonstrates the power of an integrated, end-to-end Loan Origination System like Baker Hill NextGen®.
“Our team at Berkshire Bank has proudly created a culture that embodies the heart and customer-centric attitude of a community bank, a trusted financial advisor, and combines it with the strength and resources of a larger institution. Baker Hill is an essential partner,” said Gillanders. “We are exceptionally proud of what we’ve achieved together so far, and we anticipate more success in the future, especially as Baker Hill continues to iterate and expand its product offerings with new integrations and partnerships.”
