Harmoney offers bigger loans

It said, thanks to comprehensive credit reporting and having dealt with $2.6 billion in applications, it had been able to conduct detailed analysis to make the change.

“One data-led decision from this analysis is that the loan limit for selected top-quality customers has room to increase,” it said in a note to investors.

“As a result, the maximum loan limit has now increased to up to $70,000 for some borrowers.”

Harmoney assigns its interest rates according to risk, so those who are deemed to be the highest risk of default pay the most for their loans.

“We have enhanced our scorecard with an additional factor (borrowing limit) and therefore all factors combined in the scorecard will determine the risk of default. This has been factored in when the Borrower has been assigned a risk grade,” Harmoney said.

Harmoney said it would only allow the higher limit for borrowers who could reasonably afford to service it.

Existing borrowers will be able to rewrite their loans for a higher limit.

It is also now offering Payment Protect to all borrowers, as an optional extra. It protects against unexpected events that might stop them paying their loans, such as redundancy.

In beta testing, about 30% of borrowers chose to take it up.