Comprehensive credit reporting leads to more approvals

Access to comprehensive credit data in New Zealand has resulted in a significant shift in lending decisions, with more applicants with poor credit histories likely to have their applications accepted.

Credit reporting agency Veda has released details of a study of the New Zealand consumer credit market, where comprehensive credit reporting has been in place since 2012. Australia's move from negative to comprehensive reporting was in March last year.

Veda said access to comprehensive data resulted in a different lending decision in about 20 per cent of cases.

Veda's general manager of consumer risk, Angus Luffman, said: "Some consumers have a default on their files but have established a good credit history since the negative listing. They are more likely to have their credit applications approved now.

"On the other hand, there are consumers who have no negative history but have built up some arrears.

"The net movement has been towards more approvals," Luffman said.

Veda has launched an updated version of its credit scoring product, VedaScore, to incorporate comprehensive data. VedaScore Apply is available on a reciprocal basis - that is, only lenders that are feeding comprehensive data into the system can have access to credit scores that include comprehensive data.

Luffman would not say how many credit providers were supplying comprehensive data.

"The Australian credit industry is in the early stages of a major transition," he said.

Luffman said the New Zealand experience also showed that comprehensive data improved the predictive power of credit scoring tools.