Credit card applicants in the UAE will now get a pre-approved status based on their credit score owing to a new partnership, local reports have said.
The UAE’s Al Etihad Credit Bureau or AECB has joined hands with online financial aggregator Policybazaar UAE to implement real-time eligibility checks for credit card applications based on the AECB Credit Score and banks’ approval criteria, said the reports.
This is expected to enable banks to approve applications faster and individuals to have access to their credit scores through multiple digital distribution channels.
As a result, credit-card applicants will now reportedly get a pre-approved status faster with their AECB score being checked automatically.
Policybazaar.ae will reportedly bear the costs of the AECB Credit Score, which will be displayed real-time on screen and delivered to the applicants via email by AECB.
As per Marwan Ahmad Lutfi, CEO of AECB, the system now allows marketplaces, aggregators, and potentially any digital platform to integrate with AECB’s systems through APIs, enabling individuals in the UAE to obtain their AECB Credit Scores through digital channels.
Neeraj Gupta, CEO of Policybazaar UAE, was quoted by the local reports as saying that this integration would offer the customers instant and convenient access to their AECB credit scores on the Policybazaar.ae platform.
He added that this tie-up also laid out an analytical framework for customers in the UAE to make informed financial decisions while having immediate access to their financial information.
Set up in November 2014, AECB brings transparency to the lending industry by assembling a credit record of the nation’s financially active residents.
The bureau calculates the credit score using information it collects from financial and non-financial institutions in the UAE.
The AECB credit score is a three-digit number that indicates how likely customers are to make fulfill their payment obligations on time based on their past payment behavior.
Maintaining a good credit history allows customers to avoid higher interest rates and credit refusals from lenders.