John Freeman, AFSA's vice president, e-Standards, (seen in photo with James Puzniak, President, Lending Systems & Services Group, Fiserv, Inc.) addressed attendees at the Fiserv LeMans Conference last June in Las Vegas. At the conference, Freeman explained how the eSignature Act of 2000, the Revised UCC Article 9 and UETA created an opportunity for dealers and lenders to move to electronic contracting. To ensure across-the-board compliance, AFSA is drafting an eContract securitization standard to be put to a vote by November 2003. According to Freeman, participating financial institutions will benefit in the following ways: substantial cost benefits associated with origination, storage and transfer of contracts in electronic form; reduced turnaround time; and accuracy and security improvements.

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