For the past five years, data contributors and credit bureaus have been preparing for the implementation of Project Evolution, one of the most prominent projects to take place in the credit industry to date, and which is expected to improve data quality and credit reporting.
Project Evolution will unify the credit market by integrating the National Loans Register (NLR) and the South African Credit and Risk Reporting Association (SACRRA) datasets. The NLR is a dataset that hosts information on registered, unsecured loans while SACRRA is a dataset that includes information on secured and unsecured accounts.
Compuscan worked tirelessly during the preparation period in support of the project and was one of the first credit bureaus in South Africa whose loan management systems were signed off by SACRRA and could accommodate the new submission format.
By combining the NLR and SACRRA datasets, data contributors and credit bureaus no longer need to refer to information from each dataset as they are now able to access far more comprehensive credit information on credit-active consumers on one dataset, thus directly impacting their risk decisions.
Herbert Schröder, data manager at Compuscan, comments: “We are confident that the roll out of Project Evolution is going to be of great value to our clients as the merger of the NLR and SACRRA datasets will give credit providers access to more accurate, up to date and relevant consumer credit information. This will enable our clients to make more informed and speedier credit decisions.”
The new data submission process requires contributors to develop and submit files on registrations and account closures on a daily basis, and payment performance data files on a monthly basis. This means that daily submissions are no longer happening on NLR level only. As such, all contributors will benefit by viewing daily updates which enables credit providers across the board to access more up-to-date and complete data.
Schröder comments: “While Compuscan ensures that all of its datasets are up to date, it is similarly credit providers’ responsibility to ensure that the credit data they submit is accurate and that it is shared with the bureau in terms of the new data submission guidelines.”
Making informed lending decisions and mitigating credit risk is critical to operators in the credit environment which is why Compuscan ensured that both their loan management systems were compliant with the new data submission process in good time.
“We are pleased to report that we’ve seen an improvement in the data quality since the implementation of Project Evolution as well as an improvement in operational efficiency and delivery,” Schröder says. “This will assist us in further providing our clients with a range of accurate datasets, credit scoring, data analytics services and applications to accurately establish the ability of each borrower to meet the terms of their credit agreements.”
