How Lenders Can Streamline Loan Approvals and Detect Fraud

Balancing real-time credit application outcomes with appropriate risk management (such as fraud risk) is a significant challenge for lenders. Slow and manual loan approval processes pose a major issue for lenders, as it increases the cost of origination and impacts the experience of all parties: borrowers, brokers and lenders.

More lenders have been adopting automation to overcome these obstacles (eg. using CDR or screen scraping). Yet, the manual review of financial documentation often remains a hindrance to achieving a real time application outcome for customers, driven by a need to verify income as well as income documents. This has led to lenders seeking more effective document and income verification tools like Protect from Fortiro.

According to a recent survey by Experian, one-fifth of Australians admitted to not providing complete information on their credit applications.

The most common inaccuracies included understating living costs (41%), understating existing debts (30%) and overstating income (21%). Inaccurate information was most commonly found in credit card applications (44%), personal loan applications (38%), and home loan applications (25%).

Of home loan applications, 28% had understated existing debts, 21% had overstated income.

Whilst not all of these applicants are deliberately misleading a lender, these statistics demonstrate the prevalence and risk of so-called ‘liar loans’. Where this becomes problematic for lenders is when applicants – whether it be ‘opportunistic’ individuals or more organised fraudsters – manipulate financial documents to support the claims on the application. This creates a need for lending institutions to build more efficient document fraud detection capability. Solutions like Fortiro Protect minimise the risk of fraud and support responsible lending practices.

How does Fortiro Protect work?

Protect helps lenders automate document fraud detection and reduce manual review time. It uses a range of advanced techniques designed to recognise genuine income documents and perform a detailed forensic analysis to detect manipulated or fabricated documents.

The Fortiro Protect engine analyses documents in three ways:

1. Content analysis

This involves checking for discrepancies and verifying content against other data sources. For example, checking the ABN on a payslip is registered on the Australian Business Register.

2. Layout and visual analysis

Recognising differences in the layout and appearance of documents. These differences might go unnoticed by a human in comparison to genuine documents. This can include differences in fonts, formatting, and layout in general – eg. where tables and images appear.

3. Digital analysis

Examining the digital makeup of a document including the metadata, layers or hidden text to identify manipulated or fabricated documents.

Using these techniques, Fortiro can detect fraudulent documents with a high degree of accuracy –  whilst fast-tracking genuine documents. This means lenders can approve loans faster while reducing the risk of fraud.

Benefits of Using Fortiro Protect

1. Improved document fraud detection

Lenders are able to uplift fraud capability and detect fraudulent applications without relying on manual reviews alone. This helps to reduce the risk of fraud events and protect lenders’ assets.

2. Faster loan approvals

Lenders are able to approve loans faster because the system can verify documents in a matter of seconds. This means that borrowers can get the funds they need in a shorter amount of time. It can be especially important in time-sensitive situations.

3. Reduced reliance on manual reviews

By automating fraud detection, lenders can reduce their reliance on manual reviews. This helps to free up resources and reduce costs.

4. Better customer experience

Faster loan approvals and a more streamlined process mean borrowers have a better experience when applying for loans. This can help to attract and keep customers in a competitive lending landscape.

Fortiro Protect in Action

A lending institution that provides secured and unsecured lending products, such as credit cards, personal loans, and home loans has recently partnered with Fortiro.

The lender already used various tools, including:

• Biometric technology
• Fraud analytics systems
• External data feeds

However, the lender still relied on manual fraud checks of crucial documents like payslips and Tax Notices of Assessment (NOAs). 

The lender sought Fortiro’s help in automating the process of document fraud detection.

By using Fortiro’s Protect, the lender was able to identify an extra 3% – 7% of loan applications that showed signs of fraud.

The system also saved considerable time and effort. Manual checks typically took up to 19 minutes per application. Fortiro identified fraud in a rapid 30-second verification process.

As a result, this alleviated bottlenecks that led to time savings which allowed genuine applications to be processed within hours, not days. It also resulted in a ROI of over 10 times the initial investment.

By automating fraud detection, lenders can reduce the risk of fraud losses, speed up loan approvals, and provide a better customer experience. 

Our broad range of advanced techniques are designed to recognise genuine income documents and detect manipulated or fabricated documents. Fortiro Protect is a powerful tool for lenders looking to improve their fraud detection capabilities.