Supporting our customers
Understanding our customers is fundamental to our success. Our relationships with our customers are built around respect and collaboration with the goal of providing affordable financial solutions tailored to their needs as a pathway towards mainstream financial inclusion.
We want to make it easier for our customers to do business with us, and create opportunities that will ultimately allow them to participate in parts of the economy they may have been excluded from.
Customer engagement
A good relationship with our customers is critical to agreeing appropriate financial solutions. We are collaborative and take a respectful and understanding approach to each customer’s situation. We work with our customers to ensure a sustainable and realistic repayment solution.
Credit Corp maintains a number of proactive controls to identify and respond to hardship, sensitive issues or dissatisfaction in order to provide the best service to our customers. In addition to this, we have measures to identify and assist customers facing vulnerability. We reinforce contact points within our business with Financial Counselling Australia for escalation of any particular cases their members may wish to discuss.
Lowest industry complaint rates
We maintain the lowest number of external dispute resolution (EDR) complaints per million dollars collected in our industry, as sourced from published results by our EDR provider. Our complaint rate is more than 30 per cent lower than our nearest competitor.
In the US, we maintain a dispute rate per million dollars collected which is significantly lower than our publicly-traded competitors as reported by the federal regulator.
Customer advocacy
We work closely with financial counsellors and consumer advocates to develop responsible financial solutions for our customers, and offer a dedicated escalation point for financial counsellors through our Customer Experience function.
We recognise the important role financial counsellors play in assisting vulnerable consumers and we sponsor a number of financial counsellor conferences every year. We train all of our frontline operations staff to identify and respond to financial hardship, whether raised by a customer or financial counsellor, and empower them to apply appropriate forbearance to address hardship at the first point of contact.
In December 2023, Financial Counselling Australia (FCA) released its bi-annual Rank the Banks survey. For the second time in a row, Credit Corp scored higher than all the financial services providers surveyed across Australia when it comes to responding to financial hardship.
Jan Pentland scholarship
For the last ten years, Credit Corp has granted an annual scholarship through the Jan Pentland Foundation, aimed at providing an opportunity for a recipient in the not for profit sector to gain their Diploma in Financial Counselling.
The Foundation honours Jan Pentland, who championed the cause for financial counselling and campaigned for a better deal for people on low incomes or who were vulnerable.
The 2025 scholarship winner was announced at the FCA National Conference in May. This year’s recipient, Angela, is based in regional Victoria and impressed us with her passion for becoming a financial counsellor:
"Becoming a financial counsellor has always been a dream of mine and the financial assistance will give me an opportunity to immerse myself in my studies and complete the 220 hours of work placement for my Diploma. My aspiration is to work for a not-for-profit financial counselling group focusing on rural small businesses or individuals. I am currently helping my brother run his small business and can see the need for better financial literacy and advocacy for small businesses, individuals and families who can’t find their way out of their financial situation. The support and understanding a counsellor can offer for people is imperative to their wellbeing of self and their business, and I feel like this is an area where I will be able to make a real difference."
Responsible lending
Aligned with our purpose, we recognise that many in the community face barriers to accessing credit. Our customers are often excluded from mainstream finance or limited to borrowing alternatives that are significantly more expensive.
Technological efficiency and a low cost structure allows us to offer customers some of the most affordable loan products in the credit-impaired segment. Our brands include Wallet Wizard, CarStart, and Wizit.
We are committed to responsible lending and hold an Australian Credit Licence, complying with all relevant laws and regulations, including responsible lending and design and distribution obligations.