FILE PHOTO | NMG
The move by Treasury, which has published a new set of rules directing that borrowers should not be denied loans solely on account of their credit scores, has made an important step and the public will surely hope that MPs approve the regulations.
Over that time, lenders, including those who are not regulated, have been using CRBs to blacklist borrowers, including those who default on small amounts of money, such as digital loans worth hundreds of shillings.
While the original understanding was that a CRB score was to be used as one of the parameters for determining borrowers’ risk profile, lenders have today used listing to deny applications.
As a result, more than one million borrowers have been blacklisted by the CRBs for defaulting on less than Sh1,000, something that can easily be linked to the “easy” and aggressively marketed mobile phone loans.
That said, the bottom line remains that borrowers currently wallowing in the corona lockdowns should not be denied loans just because of CRB negative listing as has been happening.
