Loans from Dhani mysteriously appear on non-borrower credit reports

According to complaints filed by borrowers, which point to incidents of identity theft on a large scale, these loans have been taken in the last six months through fraudulent customer details, where only the Permanent Account Number (PAN) is the actual was found. Some of the affected borrowers have now approached the cyber crime authorities and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for redressal.

Mint spoke to several individuals who said they did not know how the loans are linked to their PAN numbers. While one said that their issue was resolved a day ago, the other is yet to see a solution.

Surya Tripathi, a 30-year-old pharma company employee from Gorakhpur, said, “I noticed that my credit score is falling since November 2021. A closer look at the loan details revealed that two loans from IVL Finance were wrongly attributed to me. were responsible.” , Uttar Pradesh.

Indiabulls Consumer Finance Limited was earlier called as IVL Finance Limited. Dhani is a completely online personal loan offering, which provides money to customers directly into their bank accounts, according to its website.

Two different Dhani loans are part of Tripathi’s credit history, affecting his credit score and his ability to borrow in the future.

Credit scoring is the process of assessing the creditworthiness of a potential borrower. Experts recommend that consumers check their credit scores regularly, at least once a quarter.

In another instance, Delhi resident Dilip Kumar said that he came to know in November last year that a wealthy loan was attributed to him even though he had never applied for it. Kumar said he immediately wrote to Dhani’s support team, told them about the discrepancy and then referred it to the RBI Ombudsman a month later.

Soon after the RBI complaint, he received a mail from the lender’s grievance redressal team.

“With reference to your RBI complaint, we would like to inform you that as per preliminary investigation it has been observed that your KYC documents have been tampered with and misused for availing credit facilities from our company,” emailed Dhani’s complaint team said sent on January 13. The mint has seen a copy of the mail.

The company also stated that it is “not a party to the said Act” and “has duly adhered to the prescribed operating guidelines, regulations while conducting its business”. It said it has taken steps to remove the credit reference from the records of Kumar’s credit information company.

“So far, it has been omitted from the report of one credit information company, while the others have so far been removed,” said Kumar, 32, a software engineer.

The company has been slow in adding new customers over the past month as it wanted to tighten its processes, a person aware of the development said, adding that the lender has also decided to write off such loans after verifying the claims. He added that the issue is not just limited to Dhani and has affected other fintech lenders as well.

A spokesperson for Dhani Loans and Services said in an emailed reply, “It has come to our notice of a few cases where unscrupulous persons have used PAN of other people and the like to avail loans through fintech operations on the App. Have used credentials from credit bureaus.” ,

The spokesperson said the lender is talking to all complainants and establishing whether any cases of identity theft have been reported, then immediately correct their records with the credit bureaus. The statement said that Dhani has extended micro transaction finance loans to over 35 lakh people in the last 12 months and 99.9% have gone to genuine people who have benefited from this offering.