More credit unions saw improvements last year in the NCUA examination process, but experienced a decline in theirexaminers' capabilities, according to the September issue ofEconomic & CU Monitor, NAFCU's monthlynewsletter.

Monitoring the exam process and lobbying NCUA for improvementson behalf of its members is something that NAFCU has been doing forsome time, trade association officials said in follow upinterviews.

The dichotomy among anecdotalresponses creates interesting comparisons, according to Carrie Hunt, NAFCU's senior vice president of governmentaffairs and general counsel.

“Our goal is to have everyone have a fair exam that is notproblematic to the credit union,” Hunt said Monday. “We want tomake sure the transparency is there to make that happen.”

(Click on the image at left to see expandedversion.)

Credit unions responding to this year's survey provided mixedresults. Roughly one in eight, or 12.2%, said the exam process wasworse than in the past, while 24.5% said the process was better.Conversely, 8.3% of respondents found their examiner to be morecompetent than in the past, while 14.6 % found the examiner lesscompetent.

In addition, 8.7% of survey participants claimed that examreport clarity had improved, while 6.5% thought that clarity hadworsened.

“The most surprising result concerned whether exam process hadimproved,” said David Carrier, NAFCU's chief economist and director ofresearch. “When we asked the same questions in August 2012, 0% ofcredit unions responding said the process was better, while thistime more than 24% said it was better.

“Paradoxically, 14.6% of this year's respondents found examinersless competent, while 8.3% found them less competent in August2012.”

One possible variable that may have influenced the conflictingscore was the reduction in the number of Documents of Resolutioncredit unions received, Carrier said. The majority of thosereceiving a DOR asking for a correction felt the examiner had madea major issue out of a minor one, but the number of DORs themselveshad gone down compared to last year.

“I don't know enough about the exam process to know withcertainty, but the clue I got was the number of credit unionsreceiving a DOR this year was 35.4%, whereas last time it was51.4%,” Carrier said.

“I can understand why people might be feeling more warm andfuzzy this time than last time. That they found the process morehelpful than they have in the past that would be my interpretationof the data,” the NAFCU chief economist said.

John Fairbanks, NCUA spokesman, said, “NCUA is constantlyworking to streamline and modernize regulation, providing reliefwherever possible while protecting the safety and soundness of theindustry and the Share Insurance Fund. “

He added, “Likewise, the agency continually works to improve theconsistency, transparency and professionalism of the examinationprocess.”