SHAREReport - Skipton Building Society
Background
Skipton is the UK's fourth
largest building society. Founded in 1853, it has more than 830,000
members and a national presence, with 104 branches and three
agencies stretching from Aberdeen to Plymouth.
An innovator in the field of mortgage and investment products, the
Society stands apart from its peers due to its uniquely diversified
business model, with 19 subsidiary companies operating in
complementary areas such as mortgage administration, estate agency
and financial advice.
Challenges
- To provide a credit risk system for Skipton Building Society's mortgage applications that was easy to use and suitable for the various lending channels of branch, intermediary and direct
- To ensure that the system was fully integrated with Skipton's lending policy and expandable to cater for future legislative changes
- To give the Society access to additional data sources, as applicable, to support its lending decisions.
Solution
Skipton needed a credit risk system capable of accessing a wealth of consumer credit information while integrating with its existing, in-house systems.
Callcredit's SHAREReport is a credit report which confirms an applicant's name, address and the presence or absence of any adverse public data, such as County Court Judgements, Individual Voluntary Arrangements and decrees. It also shows the applicant's repayment record in relation to credit commitments such as loans, credit cards and mortgages over the previous last six years.
While SHAREReport is available via the web, to fully deliver on Skipton's requirements it was necessary to integrate SHAREReport data with Skipton's own information. Callcredit provides an Application Programming Interface (API) which enables Skipton to obtain subject information in a controlled manner by exchanging data in an XML format. This allows the Society to consult SHAREReport data and combine it with data in Skipton Building Society's own Chequemate software.
Customers' information is entered into Skipton's processing
system, and then checked against SHAREReport data. It was
important to Skipton Building Society to have access to as much
data as possible to aid its decision making and therefore both
summary and detailed information is returned, maximising the
functionality of the SHAREReport. Combined with this data,
Skipton's in-house lending criteria are used to return a yes, no or
refer decision.
Underwriters access the same core system via the web and can
provide quick decisions in principle or full mortgage acceptance to
their customers. Intermediaries also appreciate the
accessibility of the system, which allows them the
flexibility they require to meet their customers' varied needs.
The system was designed to emulate the look and feel of the web based Callcredit SHAREReport, to support referrals from branch applications.
The integrated system using the API proved a success and, with an eye to changing mortgage regulation, Skipton has extended the range of data it takes from Callcredit when performing credit searches, and has updated its scorecard and lending policies accordingly.
The additional information from the SHAREReport database supplements Skipton's customer information to support the lending decision and the initial design of the integration has enabled extensions to be implemented with more focus on developing the scorecard and less on obtaining the data.
Benefits
The system met the initial requirements and delivered a means of assessing lending risk. This is now being extended to provide more extensive credit risk checks without increasing processing time, which helps to maintain customer satisfaction while managing risk.
The flexibility that has been built into the system is now allowing Skipton to focus its time on developing the new scorecards it requires and less on the systems side, so that it can be ready to respond quickly to both changing conditions and legislative developments.
The new system's availability and ease of use has also enhanced its service to intermediaries, which are a mainstay of its lending framework.
Colin Dale, Head of Lending at Skipton Building Society, said:
"We're delighted with the service Callcredit has provided. The system works really well within our existing decision making process and doesn't slow down service for our customers. We're now working with Callcredit to further enhance our data in support of future lending decisions."
