Credit Bureau Agencies Record 71% Increase in Complaints, Disputes

The total number of complaints and disputes received from customers of financial institutions to credit bureau agencies increased from 2,781 In December 2018 to 4763 in December 2019.

This represents an increase of 71 per cent.

This was captured the annual report on credit referencing activity released on October 5, 2020 by the Bank of Ghana.

The report also indicated that, the credit reports from most customers were problematic due to inaccuracies and as such were denied access to credit facilities. This in effect spiked up the number of customer complaints and disputes recorded in the period under review.

“Most of the recorded disputes were as a result of customers with impaired credit reports occasioned by inaccurate information on the credit reports and who were subsequently refused credit facilities”.

A chart of figures presented by the Bank of Ghana on the trends in complaints and disputes of customers of financial institutions to credit bureau agencies provided in the report also made it clear that there was a steady and consistent increase in customer complaints and disputes for every year from 2014 up to 2019. The figures provided in the chart revealed that at the end of the years 2014 and 2015 customer complaints and disputes recorded was a little over 700. This shot up to 1280 complaints and dispute by the end of the year 2016. In the year 2017, customer complaints and disputes to credit bureau agencies stood at 1418. The number of customer complaints and disputes was close to twice the 2017 figure in the year 2018, recording a sudden increase to 2781 which was extremely high. By the end of December 2019, the total number of customer complaints and disputes to credit bureau agencies increased tremendously to 4763. These estimations from the report suggested that year-on-year more complaints and disputes were made by customers of financial institutions to credit bureau agencies.

The report further asserted that the general public were becoming increasingly aware of credit referencing activities and there are also challenges with the quality of data submitted by financial institutions to credit bureau agencies hence the increasing trend in the number of customer complaints and disputes.

“This increasing trend is attributable to the increased awareness of credit  referencing among the public and also due to the quality of data submitted to credit bureaus by financial institutions”.

In conclusion, the report said that even though there has been some improvement in the Credit Referencing System since its inception in 2010, there are challenges with quality of data. To address this challenge, the Bank of Ghana has laid down sanctions for breaches of data submission requirements.

“The Credit Referencing System has witnessed a number of improvements since its full implementation in 2010. Nonetheless, the following challenges continue to  confront the system and limiting its optimum performance”.

“The Bank of Ghana in an effort to curb this challenge has begun its enforcement  action on breaches of data submission requirements. It is therefore anticipated that data providers would adhere strictly to the data requirements of credit  bureaus”.