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| Edited By: Praveena Sharma |Source: DNA |Updated: Mar 21, 2018, 06:13 AM IST
Is CashCare focusing on any particular product segment for lending or is it doing it across all segments?
We are covering all sorts of products. We have realised that consumers – in mid-20s and mid-30s – when they are just about to start their life, acquire assets. Today, these assets are phones, TVs, furniture and others such things. They also like to borrow for travel and education. So, our coverage is across all types of consumer needs.
We are growing at 100% every month. We have processed 10,000 loan applications from February last year till now.
We do it in two steps – credit appraisal and customer verification. For credit appraisal, we collect all the data to verify the customer's credit history and are able to give an answer on a real-time basis. Here, we look at his Cibil (Credit Information Bureau India Limited) history, shopping history and social connections. On customer verification, which is more of know-your-customer (KYC) and a regulatory requirement mandated by the RBI (Reserve Bank of India), we have a national-level reach through various agencies who do it within 24 hours.
We've been extremely methodical in the way we have approached credit. We know it's not only about giving loans, but also about making sure that the money comes back. What we do is we evaluate our credit algorithm on a monthly basis and understand from the repayment records where things are working and where they are not. There were times in initial phases when we had a slightly higher NPA (non-performing asset) rate but today we are able to maintain our NPA at market level.
The market NPA level for retail sector is 1-3% of the total loans. We fall within that. Our NPA rate is fairly stable. This is where there is a difference between players like us and a traditional bank or an NBFC (non-banking financial company). Our data analysing capabilities are so strong that we are able to assess the consumer in a much deeper manner because the traditional way of doing it is extremely subjective. It comes down to the person sitting at the desk who goes through the files. In our case, nothing is left to human intervention other than the KYC piece. Our method is also consistent across all consumers. It's not like one day you say let's give loan to this guy and then next day you say no to the other guy with same parameters. This is where we are disrupting the credit market as we take out any human nuances in loans. Credit is actually a tangible exercise, and not a subjective exercise.
We are a purely technology company which provides its e-financing tech products. At the back-end, we work with multiple NBFCs. All the interest income goes to them and we get paid for our expertise. The wonderful part is that we do not have a capital constraint. Tomorrow, if we want a Rs1 lakh crore or Rs 7 lakh crore loan book, all we need to do is add more partners rather than going out to raise the money. From e-commerce merchants, we make our money from payment gateways. Today, we have partnered with two NBFCs. We will be adding five more by January 2017. We are working with 12 e-commerce merchants and are adding 2-4 of them every month.
With Cashcare, we have built a credit solution for online platforms. Our objective is to provide a credit solution when consumers are about to make a purchase, where if you are buying a product you should be able to convert its payment into EMIs. We work with e-commerce merchants like Shopclues, Fabfurnish, Makemytrip and also offline stores, along with NBFCs.
