Can your social media footprint help repay debt?

Online lender 247Moneybox.co.nz, the consumer lending operation recently launched in New Zealand by UK fintech firm Active Securities, is seeking to improve its credit decisioning process by monitoring its customers’ social media activity.

While traditional lenders tend to focus on criteria such as credit score and income to assess loan applicants, 247Moneybox.co.nz takes this a step further by factoring in thousands of additional data points.

The company is now delving deeper into online and social media behaviour, and is updating its application form to capture an applicant’s Facebook and Twitter usernames.

The reasoning behind this is that by capturing more data streams, the loan decision engine can make more accurate and reliable credit decisions that are better suited to the needs of short-term borrowers, according to Mark Hannay, COO of 247Moneybox.co.nz.

“We certainly don’t want to give the impression that there is a strong and direct correlation between our customers’ ability to repay their debt, and their social media footprint,” Hannay says.

“Factors such as Facebook friends and Twitter followers are merely additional useful pieces of information to complement the thousands of other data inputs we take into account.”

Technology has always been at the core of the company’s business model. By leveraging all the data available in an increasingly interconnected and online world, 247Moneybox.co.nz is offering speedy and reliable access to short term credit to an audience often underserved by traditional banks and lenders.

“We have a four-year track record of lending responsibly and providing a new type of financing facility,” Hannay adds.

“That said, we feel there will always be room for improvement through technological innovation. By looking at someone’s social media footprint it can help provide useful context to an applicant and the information they provide which in turn helps us make better lending decisions.”