Women continue to feel financial impact of the pandemic

12th January 2022 Consumer Collections |

New research from Quilter has found that if another lockdown is implemented as a result of the Omicron variant, many women consider themselves in a worse off position financially. The research, carried out by YouGov for Quilter, found that more than one in five (22%) women said they were in a worse position financially than…

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Tandem Bank to acquire Oplo

12th January 2022 Company News | #merger

Tandem Bank has announced it is acquiring consumer lender, Oplo with the merger aiming to create a fairer, greener digital bank for UK consumers. The newly combined business will create a leading digital bank with £1.2 billion of total assets supported by £1 billion of funding with more than 171,000 customers. Tandem’s CEO Susie Aliker…

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Key and Aveni.ai agree customer vulnerability partnership

12th January 2022 Company News |

Equity release specialist Key has revealed it is working with speech analytics platform Aveni.ai as it seeks to build on its customer service with artificial intelligence. The strategic partnership embeds Aveni.ai at the heart of Key’s customer interactions – monitoring conversations with artificial intelligence (AI) to improve the later life lending specialist’s ability to identify…

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Half of consumers want urgent help managing their money

Nearly half of consumers(44%) want urgent help in managing their own money, according to a new opinion poll highlighting the dire state of the personal finances of millions of people. The findings come from a poll by Opinium of 4,000 people commissioned by the leading think-tank, the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), and credit management company…

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Access to interbank payment systems continues to grow

12th January 2022 Consumer Lending | #payments

The PSR has published its latest access and governance report, showing trends and developments in interbank payment systems over 2019 and 2020. The report details how new participants have been able to join payment systems (access) and notes developments in how the payment systems have been run and operated (governance). This shows that interbank payment…

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Coventry Building Society launches new customer affordability tool

12th January 2022 Company News |

Coventry Building Society has launched a new online affordability tool to help mortgage customers facing financial difficulties. The tool, delivered by fintech Paylink Solutions, allows customers to self-serve and provide their affordability using SFS guidelines. They can also be seamlessly referred for free debt advice to Paylink Solutions’ sister company, PayPlan, to support them with…

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Card spending increases to two-year high

Black Friday and Christmas has helped card average spending to increase to a new over two-year high according to new analysis of UK card trends for November 2021 by FICO. With average spending and cash usage rising, the data was typical of previous festive seasons. However, a drop in the percentage of payments to balance…

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Rising living costs erode household finances

Households have suffered the sharpest fall in the amount of cash they have available to spend for almost eight years, amid a worsening cost of living crisis driven by high inflation and rising energy bills. Research by Scottish Widows’ Household Finance Index found that surging living costs hit people’s pockets and led to the steepest…

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