President Joe Biden’s changes to the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) announced Monday will not affect automations financial institutions already have in place.

PPP loans are intended for small businesses, and the program received criticism after the Washington Post reported most of the total loans issued went to bigger businesses. Biden’s announcement this week ordered the Small Business Administration (SBA) to only process PPP loan applications for eligible small businesses with fewer than 20 employees. The restriction begins Feb. 24, and will last 14 days.

Suncrest Bank, a $1.29 billion commercial lender based in the greater Sacramento area, was among those to automate PPP in the second $284 billion funding round. Chief Operating Officer Steve Jones said the restriction still leaves plenty of time to process loans for larger businesses.

“This does put a hold on loans for those businesses with greater than 20 employees, but that is a very small percentage of our customers, as we have many more small businesses with employee counts under 20,” Jones said. “Our partner, Numerated, will have our portal ready for this switch beginning tomorrow. So no, it does not cause problems for processing the loans.”

Jack Henry also stood up a PPP automated solution. While it did require some adaptation to accommodate the new rules, it was easily adjusted, said Terry Renoux, head of Jack Henry Lending.

“This change will be troubling for lenders not using automation or automation that has not adjusted,” Renoux said. He recommended those banks consider moving to a referral arrangement with a third-party lender, like Jack Henry’s own partnership with Biz2Credit.

The lack of negative impact this new rule has on banks’ PPP operations represents a stark difference to the confusion around “unclear guidance” that muddled tech plans during the first round of PPP in April 2020, when banks reported changing SBA rules and regulations on an almost weekly basis.

More than $140 billion in forgivable loans already have been approved during the second draw of the PPP, according to the SBA.

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