PayPoint, in partnership with AperiData, has used Open Banking to develop the ‘Customer Support Tool’. This has simplified the financial review and assessment process for debt advisory charity Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB).
The GDPR-compliant solution significantly reduces the time taken to review a client’s financial position, freeing up capacity for debt advisors to help others, while also giving clients support quickly. The technology solution has been a great success, saving more than two hours of time per client supported by debt advisors and reducing attrition by over 50%.
Citizens Advice has seen a surge in demand for its services in recent years, particularly in debt and money management support. This has led to increasing pressure on advisors, meaning a more streamlined process was desperately needed.
Due to the nature of the service, advisors handled large quantities of financial statements and information in order to assess a client’s financial situation and be able to support with debt management services. The financial information provided was generally in paper-form and advisors would go through a lengthy manual process of organising and reviewing documents. Not only was this time-consuming, but it could also be intimidating and emotionally challenging for the individuals requiring help, often leading to high client attrition.
To address this, PayPoint and AperiData developed the ‘Customer Support Tool’, which has now been in use by Citizens Advice Stevenage for one year and has been rolled out to several other CAB offices across the UK.
Thanks to Open Banking, the ‘Customer Support Tool’ simplifies the data collection process by allowing clients to give consent online and granting debt caseworkers permission to receive a comprehensive and categorised summary of all of the client’s finances within moments.
The financial data provided is clearly presented on a digital platform and gives an accurate overview of the client’s current financial situation. Historically, credit reports were, by nature, out of date due to statements provided in arrears and the time taken to collect the portfolio. This tool has therefore drastically cut down the time taken to support individuals, allowing debt advisors to support more people, faster than ever before.
The ‘Customer Support Tool’ can be used in many scenarios where a comprehensive financial history is required. More information on how this tool could help your organisation can be found here.
PayPoint is a gold partner of Open Banking Expo UK and Europe, taking place at the Business Design Centre in London on 15-16 October. Click here to find out more about attending, exhibiting and sponsoring.
