Each week we take a look at some of the latest fintech news to hit the industry. This week, PensionBee publishes gender pay gap figures for 2021 and TSB issues urgent warning over prolific Impersonation Fraud.
Capitalise is now available on Xero App Store
Capitalise, the platform that gives businesses and their advisers’ transparency and control over business finance in one place, has announced a new integration with the global small business platform, Xero. Capitalise will now be available for accountants to access on the Xero App Store. Capitalise provides accountants with full transparency and control over their business clients’ finances, unlocking their advisory potential with data combined from Xero, and credit insight from Experian and public Companies House records.
Ollie Maitland, CPO and Co-founder for Capitalise, comments: “We are thrilled to be working with Xero, which is the go-to business platform for many small businesses where we currently operate in the UK and South Africa. Ultimately, this integration will open the doors of a number of exciting opportunities for small businesses, who will soon have a better understanding of business performance, credit, debt recovery and funding options via their accountant.”
finova launches Broker ID platform
The UK’s largest cloud-based mortgage and savings technology provider, finova, has announced the launch of Broker ID – a data management platform designed to save lenders’ time and money with broker onboarding and due diligence processes.
Broker ID collects information from multiple data sources, including the FCA, Companies House and finova generated, and stores it all in a trusted centralised location that is accessible to all users. This removes manual, often time-consuming, sourcing tasks from lenders’ to-do lists.
Melanie Spencer, Head of finova Payment and Mortgage Services, comments: “Without effective data management, lenders are unable to gain necessary insights or perform required business tasks. Broker ID solves this, and is a single source of truth lenders can rely on. The platform saves lenders both time and money through a holistic approach that streamlines business processes and gives users instant access to the data they need. Whether it be during the onboarding process or when conducting a risk assessment, lenders can make informed decisions with confidence.”
Hometrack and Mortgage Brain partner
Hometrack, the industry-leading provider of valuation and automation solutions, and Mortgage Brain, the experts in mortgage technology, have partnered to provide a game-changing solution that streamlines and digitises one of the recognised pain points suffered by brokers and their customers.
The new partnership allows Hometrack’s new Broker AVM to be embedded within Mortgage Brain’s Broker Platform and provided automatically to every single broker user, ensuring they and their customers experience a slicker mortgage application process.
PensionBee publishes gender pay gap figures for 2021
PensionBee, an online pension provider, has revealed a median hourly pay gap of just 1.6 per cent, and a median bonus pay gap of 0 per cent among its staff, as of 31 December 2021. The gap is in line with PensionBee’s target of 0 per cent, with a variance of +/- 5 per cent owing to the overall size of the employee base.
PensionBee has achieved complete gender parity at a company-wide level and actively recruits females into traditionally male-dominated positions, such as technology roles. PensionBee also remains focused on promoting women who have the potential to reach the management team, as firm believers that gender-balanced teams create better products and services for consumers.
Romi Savova, CEO of PensionBee, commented: “At PensionBee, we passionately believe that men and women should be paid equally for equal work and have found from our own research that this is the only effective solution to eradicate the gender pension gap once and for all. That’s why we have committed to voluntarily tracking these figures as early as possible, so if necessary, changes are easier to make.
I’m immensely proud of the level of diversity we’ve achieved in the company so far and I have no doubt there’s a direct correlation to our low gender pay gap.”
Nova Credit expands into Europe
Nova Credit, the fintech unlocking opportunities for those historically excluded from the credit system and companies looking to serve them, has announced the company’s expansion into Europe starting in the UK.
Collin Galster, VP International at Nova Credit & Director of Nova Credit UK, comments: “Millions of immigrants cross borders every year to work, study and establish new lives for themselves and their families. In doing so, they leave years of credit history behind them, ‘stuck’ in the countries they’ve left. The majority of these individuals are creditworthy, yet underserved. Without access to their past credit history, lenders have no choice but to automatically decline their applications for new finance.
“The global credit reporting system was built within national silos that fail to meet the needs of an increasingly globalised and integrated world. Newcomers lack access to the funds they need to finance new homes, cars, education, or phone contracts and must spend years rebuilding their credit scores from scratch. Likewise, lenders want to be able to serve this vast market of creditworthy individuals but lack the tools to do so. We’re thrilled to finally bring our cross-border capabilities to serve migrant corridors destined for and within Europe.”
Reassured launches digital platform
The UK’s largest insurance broker, Reassured has launched its new digital platform, offering customers the opportunity to directly purchase life insurance online, providing quick and easy access to financial protection.
Along with Reassured Advice Limited, launched in 2021, this means that Reassured can now offer the full breadth of purchase routes for those seeking Protection, making the firm truly omnichannel.
The digital proposition, launched in collaboration with established technology firm The IDOL, currently boasts six major insurers: Legal & General, Aviva, LV=, Zurich, AIG Life and Vitality Life and offers a genuine “buy now” process, based on a single underwriting question set and is fully customisable for use by partner firms on a white label basis.
TSB issues urgent warning over prolific Impersonation Fraud
Impersonation Fraud accounts for a third of TSB fraud cases since the start of the year, spiking 300 per cent since 2019, reaffirming TSB’s decision to step in and protect its customers from increasingly complex scams, by introducing its Fraud Refund Guarantee in April 2019.
TSB categorises impersonation fraud as an attack in which a criminal impersonates a company, business, organisation or an individual as the key component of the scam. The category accounted for over half of TSB customer transactions to fraudsters by value in 2021.
Paul Davis, Director of Fraud Prevention, TSB, said: “Households are bombarded with scam calls, texts and emails every day – we’re urging them to remain suspicious of any unsolicited contact, to avoid falling victim to fraud at a time when the impact would be hardest felt.
“We continue to be the only bank to protect customers from fraud losses, through our Fraud Refund Guarantee, which is as important now as it’s ever been to the lives of our customers.”
