Rynoh Solutions / About Us / The Rynoh Story
The Rynoh Story
RynohLive
was designed and developed by Richard M. Reass over the last
five years. The parent company, Segin Systems was formed for the sole
purpose of developing RynohLive and other innovative software
products for the real estate and financial services industry. Rynoh
development began in early 2004. The genesis of Rynoh was the
result of Mr. Reass having attended the 2003 Annual ALTA Convention
in Phoenix. During that conference, Frank Abagnale was a
keynote speaker. The central theme of his presentation was
check fraud and the impact it has upon businesses and individuals.
His powerful presentation delivered one impactful message; title
agencies should “only bank with those banks that provide positive
pay”.
At that time, my community bank unfortunately did not offer positive pay services, explains Mr.Reass. His company, Reliant Title located in Virginia Beach, VA had ironically just experienced the first in a series of fraudulent checks, amounting to several thousand dollars. Luckily for Reliant Title, the checks were duplicate numbers; otherwise they would have cleared the bank. Taking Mr. Abagnale’s advice to heart, Mr. Reass immediately contacted the CEO of his community bank. As one of the bank’s largest depositors, Reliant Title maintained an average collected balance of fifteen million dollars. Mr. Reass certainly felt this gave him a voice to be heard. He presented the same powerful presentation to the CEO in a desperate plea for his bank to obtain a positive pay service. Not only was he concerned for his company, Reliant Title, but also as a shareholder for the protection of the bank. Mr. Reass explained how positive pay services could also be used as a sales tool attracting additional title company escrow accounts.
Escrow accounts are highly profitable for all banks. After giving much thought to Mr. Reass’s request, the CEO unfortunately made the decision not to obtain a positive pay service. The bank was not prepared to take on the expense nor the learning curve associated with the addition of this service. Being a statistics major, Mr. Reass had calculated the worth of just his escrow account to the bank and left the meeting perplexed that his bank was not willing to move forward with his request.
As Mr. Abagnale’s powerful message played over and over, Mr. Reass immediately began his journey to find a local banking relationship offering a positive pay service. He interviewed several banks and found exactly the relationship he thought he was looking for. Once his new banking relationship was established, he quickly discovered their positive pay product was not compatible with his title software provider. After much more research, Mr. Reass determined Software interfaces for the current positive pay systems were just not available in the marketplace.
“These hurdles were not stopping me” said Reass.” I decided to build the software interface myself. I hired a software developer who would work closely with me at Reliant Title. In less than two months the interface became a reality”. Mr. Reass continues; we called the first roll out PositivePay Plus. I was confident our interface added the plus. We saw it as a solution to the positive pay discrepancies currently available in the marketplace. Reliant Title could now automatically send the positive pay file to the bank without a person remembering to manually create the file, log on to the banks secure server and transmit the positive pay file. We had created hands off operation. Our disburser no longer had to remember to send a file; we were into the world of true automation. The bank was so impressed that they invited us to roll the product out to their other clients who were experiencing check fraud problems. We immediately knew we would quickly become the industry standard.
We did not stop here. Our goals continued to grow as we brainstormed about other enhancements for PositivePay Plus. The next step would be the capability to automatically send positive pay updates to the bank throughout the day. When we first introduced Positive Pay Plus, the bank updated their positive pay files only once a day, which was at the end of each business day. This created one of many challenges. There were often situations where clients would come in to the Title Company, pick up a check for their proceeds, which would have just been prepared that same morning. The client would go directly to the bank to cash the check. As the teller took the check and scanned it for verification, the response they received was the bank had no record of the check being issued. Remembering positive pay files only update once a day, at the end of the business day, this created a customer service disaster. Teller’s would simply say to the customer the check could not be cashed or the bank had no record of the check being issued. Sometimes the teller exceeded customer service expectations and called the title company or asked a manager to verify the validity of the check. If the teller was unable to get a response from the title company or the approval of a bank manger, an immediate customer service disaster occurred. Realtor's and loan officers were often contacted. This created a lot of bad press which continues today for title companies using inadequate positive pay systems. Working closely with our bank, we quickly established changes in their internal banking system process. Their processed positive pay systems would now be updated multiple times a day. Rynoh would provide up to the minute listings of checks issued by the company. This was truly a positive pay system.
This was still not enough for Reass. As he continued to encounter problems within the settlement industry, his need for more information rapidly increased. In 2005 he rolled out his next software program, E-Reconcile. A daily three way reconciliation program for the settlement industry, thought Reass. Not only would this provide access to what happened within his escrow account on a daily basis, he would now actually see what should have happened. Reass says; “if I could send information to the bank why shouldn’t I have access to get information from the bank”.
E-Reconcile came on the heels of lost payoffs and an IRS judgment. The need for immediate and up to date information became even more apparent. Unfortunately for Reass and his company, he was faced with eight thousand dollars in penalties from an IRS judgment payoff. His company, Reliant Title, sent a payment to the IRS via UPS overnight service. UPS lost his package. Six months later, he was advised that penalties and interest had accrued in the amount of eight thousand dollars and as the settlement agent, he was responsible. Reass realized now more than ever the importance of making sure disbursements got where they needed to be, when they needed to be there. E-reconcile would now allow Reass to view daily reports and track every check he issued. If the report listed a discrepancy or an uncashed check, he now had the capability to immediately follow up. The final phase of Reass’s software development came in 2006 with the beta launch of what he calls Rynoh. He jokingly says, “There had to be power behind the name. What better power than that of a Rynoh”. RynohLive was developed with the capability of synchronizing positive pay submissions and daily reconciliation services. RynohLive is a fully automated escrow account management software solution. RynohLive automatically provides real time, three-way reconciliation, positive pay protection, tailored management reports and identifies escrow account anomalies. Anti-fraud algorithms generate alerts on potential fraudulent activity. This powerful software package has the capability of being synchronized with the update cycle of every bank which provides exactly what Reass believes to be the power of the program.
Reass continues on with his personal description of RynohLive. Bank data transfer is a two way process. We send data to the bank and now we can also download cleared item files. With the technology to receive these files daily, came the birth of daily reconciliation. This led to RynohLive becoming our own personal automatic daily reconciliation service. The customized management reports were developed to enhance the utility of the daily reconciliation. Reconciliation only tells you what has occurred. We wanted to have the capability to compare the actual transactions to those that should have been completed. RynohLive prepares a “Morning Report” alerting management of critical escrow account activity and reports requiring disbursing actions that should have, but did not occur. RynohLive also provides notification of potential fraudulent activity and potential RESPA audit violations
During the beta test installation process for our second user, we identified a major irregularity within the law firm’s escrow account. Staff training was scheduled three days prior to the install. The very next day the escrow clerk did not report to work and could not be reached by phone. RynohLive had the amazing capability to immediately detect the embezzlement at the time of install. By the time authorities were dispatched to her address, she had moved out. The development of a separate anti-fraud module with specific algorithms began immediately and continues today. With this new capability called RynohSecure, we have generated tremendous interest from title insurance underwriters. For the first time the underwriter in near real time can monitor the escrow account activity of their direct operations and agents using RynohSecure. This modules provides the capability to mitigate if not entirely eliminate agent defalcation losses. RynohLive is currently installed and running in the headquarter offices of three underwriters. The capability to monitor the direct operation and escrow account activity of each agent represents the magnitude of this powerful software. RynohLive is the complete software product says Reass. “ Live” is just what the name implies; live, up to the minute account activity for the settlement industry. Putting Mr. Abagnale’s message into reality, Reass has created a one of a kind software product. RynohLive has the capability to optimize the Real estate settlement services industry which lost over $250,000,000 last year due to agent defalcation, embezzlement, and fraud. There is no other product on the market today that addresses this pandemic problem.
Just last month, Reliant Title was hit with multiple fraudulent checks that originated from St Petersburg, Russia. They were part of a nationwide internet scam. Reliant Title was immediately contacted by the investigators who were “amazed” that we were all over it, says Reass! No problems for us, no problems for the bank, and no problems for the underwriters. On another RynohLive account, we detected that the bank did not honor a stop payment on a $235,000 check. It was bank error caught by RynohLive and corrected immediately. The funds were redeposited back into the settlement agent’s escrow account the very same day. Reass says” in the past, the first indication of a problem is when you get around to reconciling your escrow account or when escrow checks started bouncing.”
In the short amount of time RynohLive has been in the marketplace, it has eliminated disbursing losses, stopped embezzlement, identified defalcation and provided notification that funds were available in the bank for disbursement. RynohLive has saved users tens of thousands of dollars. “The full potential has yet to be realized as we continue to create and install additional fraud detection algorithms”, says Reass.
At that time, my community bank unfortunately did not offer positive pay services, explains Mr.Reass. His company, Reliant Title located in Virginia Beach, VA had ironically just experienced the first in a series of fraudulent checks, amounting to several thousand dollars. Luckily for Reliant Title, the checks were duplicate numbers; otherwise they would have cleared the bank. Taking Mr. Abagnale’s advice to heart, Mr. Reass immediately contacted the CEO of his community bank. As one of the bank’s largest depositors, Reliant Title maintained an average collected balance of fifteen million dollars. Mr. Reass certainly felt this gave him a voice to be heard. He presented the same powerful presentation to the CEO in a desperate plea for his bank to obtain a positive pay service. Not only was he concerned for his company, Reliant Title, but also as a shareholder for the protection of the bank. Mr. Reass explained how positive pay services could also be used as a sales tool attracting additional title company escrow accounts.
Escrow accounts are highly profitable for all banks. After giving much thought to Mr. Reass’s request, the CEO unfortunately made the decision not to obtain a positive pay service. The bank was not prepared to take on the expense nor the learning curve associated with the addition of this service. Being a statistics major, Mr. Reass had calculated the worth of just his escrow account to the bank and left the meeting perplexed that his bank was not willing to move forward with his request.
As Mr. Abagnale’s powerful message played over and over, Mr. Reass immediately began his journey to find a local banking relationship offering a positive pay service. He interviewed several banks and found exactly the relationship he thought he was looking for. Once his new banking relationship was established, he quickly discovered their positive pay product was not compatible with his title software provider. After much more research, Mr. Reass determined Software interfaces for the current positive pay systems were just not available in the marketplace.
“These hurdles were not stopping me” said Reass.” I decided to build the software interface myself. I hired a software developer who would work closely with me at Reliant Title. In less than two months the interface became a reality”. Mr. Reass continues; we called the first roll out PositivePay Plus. I was confident our interface added the plus. We saw it as a solution to the positive pay discrepancies currently available in the marketplace. Reliant Title could now automatically send the positive pay file to the bank without a person remembering to manually create the file, log on to the banks secure server and transmit the positive pay file. We had created hands off operation. Our disburser no longer had to remember to send a file; we were into the world of true automation. The bank was so impressed that they invited us to roll the product out to their other clients who were experiencing check fraud problems. We immediately knew we would quickly become the industry standard.
We did not stop here. Our goals continued to grow as we brainstormed about other enhancements for PositivePay Plus. The next step would be the capability to automatically send positive pay updates to the bank throughout the day. When we first introduced Positive Pay Plus, the bank updated their positive pay files only once a day, which was at the end of each business day. This created one of many challenges. There were often situations where clients would come in to the Title Company, pick up a check for their proceeds, which would have just been prepared that same morning. The client would go directly to the bank to cash the check. As the teller took the check and scanned it for verification, the response they received was the bank had no record of the check being issued. Remembering positive pay files only update once a day, at the end of the business day, this created a customer service disaster. Teller’s would simply say to the customer the check could not be cashed or the bank had no record of the check being issued. Sometimes the teller exceeded customer service expectations and called the title company or asked a manager to verify the validity of the check. If the teller was unable to get a response from the title company or the approval of a bank manger, an immediate customer service disaster occurred. Realtor's and loan officers were often contacted. This created a lot of bad press which continues today for title companies using inadequate positive pay systems. Working closely with our bank, we quickly established changes in their internal banking system process. Their processed positive pay systems would now be updated multiple times a day. Rynoh would provide up to the minute listings of checks issued by the company. This was truly a positive pay system.
This was still not enough for Reass. As he continued to encounter problems within the settlement industry, his need for more information rapidly increased. In 2005 he rolled out his next software program, E-Reconcile. A daily three way reconciliation program for the settlement industry, thought Reass. Not only would this provide access to what happened within his escrow account on a daily basis, he would now actually see what should have happened. Reass says; “if I could send information to the bank why shouldn’t I have access to get information from the bank”.
E-Reconcile came on the heels of lost payoffs and an IRS judgment. The need for immediate and up to date information became even more apparent. Unfortunately for Reass and his company, he was faced with eight thousand dollars in penalties from an IRS judgment payoff. His company, Reliant Title, sent a payment to the IRS via UPS overnight service. UPS lost his package. Six months later, he was advised that penalties and interest had accrued in the amount of eight thousand dollars and as the settlement agent, he was responsible. Reass realized now more than ever the importance of making sure disbursements got where they needed to be, when they needed to be there. E-reconcile would now allow Reass to view daily reports and track every check he issued. If the report listed a discrepancy or an uncashed check, he now had the capability to immediately follow up. The final phase of Reass’s software development came in 2006 with the beta launch of what he calls Rynoh. He jokingly says, “There had to be power behind the name. What better power than that of a Rynoh”. RynohLive was developed with the capability of synchronizing positive pay submissions and daily reconciliation services. RynohLive is a fully automated escrow account management software solution. RynohLive automatically provides real time, three-way reconciliation, positive pay protection, tailored management reports and identifies escrow account anomalies. Anti-fraud algorithms generate alerts on potential fraudulent activity. This powerful software package has the capability of being synchronized with the update cycle of every bank which provides exactly what Reass believes to be the power of the program.
Reass continues on with his personal description of RynohLive. Bank data transfer is a two way process. We send data to the bank and now we can also download cleared item files. With the technology to receive these files daily, came the birth of daily reconciliation. This led to RynohLive becoming our own personal automatic daily reconciliation service. The customized management reports were developed to enhance the utility of the daily reconciliation. Reconciliation only tells you what has occurred. We wanted to have the capability to compare the actual transactions to those that should have been completed. RynohLive prepares a “Morning Report” alerting management of critical escrow account activity and reports requiring disbursing actions that should have, but did not occur. RynohLive also provides notification of potential fraudulent activity and potential RESPA audit violations
During the beta test installation process for our second user, we identified a major irregularity within the law firm’s escrow account. Staff training was scheduled three days prior to the install. The very next day the escrow clerk did not report to work and could not be reached by phone. RynohLive had the amazing capability to immediately detect the embezzlement at the time of install. By the time authorities were dispatched to her address, she had moved out. The development of a separate anti-fraud module with specific algorithms began immediately and continues today. With this new capability called RynohSecure, we have generated tremendous interest from title insurance underwriters. For the first time the underwriter in near real time can monitor the escrow account activity of their direct operations and agents using RynohSecure. This modules provides the capability to mitigate if not entirely eliminate agent defalcation losses. RynohLive is currently installed and running in the headquarter offices of three underwriters. The capability to monitor the direct operation and escrow account activity of each agent represents the magnitude of this powerful software. RynohLive is the complete software product says Reass. “ Live” is just what the name implies; live, up to the minute account activity for the settlement industry. Putting Mr. Abagnale’s message into reality, Reass has created a one of a kind software product. RynohLive has the capability to optimize the Real estate settlement services industry which lost over $250,000,000 last year due to agent defalcation, embezzlement, and fraud. There is no other product on the market today that addresses this pandemic problem.
Just last month, Reliant Title was hit with multiple fraudulent checks that originated from St Petersburg, Russia. They were part of a nationwide internet scam. Reliant Title was immediately contacted by the investigators who were “amazed” that we were all over it, says Reass! No problems for us, no problems for the bank, and no problems for the underwriters. On another RynohLive account, we detected that the bank did not honor a stop payment on a $235,000 check. It was bank error caught by RynohLive and corrected immediately. The funds were redeposited back into the settlement agent’s escrow account the very same day. Reass says” in the past, the first indication of a problem is when you get around to reconciling your escrow account or when escrow checks started bouncing.”
In the short amount of time RynohLive has been in the marketplace, it has eliminated disbursing losses, stopped embezzlement, identified defalcation and provided notification that funds were available in the bank for disbursement. RynohLive has saved users tens of thousands of dollars. “The full potential has yet to be realized as we continue to create and install additional fraud detection algorithms”, says Reass.