Frequently Asked Questions about Payment Intent, First Party Fraud and more
We've collated the answers to the questions we are most often asked about Fraudscreen products, payment intent, first party fraud and much more. If you have a question that is not answered here, please do Contact Us »
General & Compliance:
- Q: What makes Fraudscreen unique?
- Q: What do you mean by payment intent?
- Q: So, you screen for fraud – is that all you do?
- Q: So, you’re a data modelling outfit?
- Q: Isn’t this just the same as credit scoring?
- Q: Where do you get your data from?
- Q: How does your coding actually work?
- Q: How come no one else has access to this data?
- Q: Can’t I just model payment intent from the data I already hold on my customers?
- Q: Is this compliant with the Data Protection Act?
- Q: How do I find out what information you hold on me?
- Q: How much does it cost?
- Q: How do I start to use Fraudscreen in practice?
- Q: How long does it take to code a database?
- Q: How does Fraudscreen benefit consumer credit applications?
Collections & Recoveries:
- Q: What’s the point of coding payment intent when someone is in arrears?
- Q: How does what you do apply to risk management?
- Q: How does payment intent apply to collections and recoveries?
- Q: How does Fraudscreen benefit pre-collections processes?
- Q: How does Fraudscreen help Debt Recovery Agencies (DCAs)?
- Q: What about Treating the Customer Fairly (TCF); is Fraudscreen fair?
Acquisition & Retention:
Q: What makes Fraudscreen unique?
A: Our products have been designed to meet the needs of consumer businesses in the UK. If you are interacting with consumer audiences of just a few hundred, or of millions, then Fraudscreen products can offer your business a significant strategic advantage. Fraudscreen provides a suite of powerful screening products to inform customer management. These are based on a wholly unique data set to which we have exclusive vendor rights. This data set is compiled from a vast array of sources to include payment and transactional records at individual and geographical levels within the UK, and is not available anywhere else on the market. This rich data is interrogated using Fraudscreen’s powerful searching and matching technology to allow companies to accurately predict which customers or segments are most likely to pay. This unique ability is in play in businesses today, reaping measurable bottom-line benefits right across the customer lifecycle from acquisition, retention and collections. To assist ease of integration into business processes, Fraudscreen has developed an intuitive colour coding system to make it easy to review and understand Fraudscreen’s data analyses. Our clients typically apply a business rule to each colour code, which can be used either in RealTime during an online or telephone transaction, or in batch to existing customer or prospect files.
Related content:
- Presentation: Having confidence in your customers (dis)honesty »
Q: What do you mean by payment intent?
A: Very simply, it means a person's intended payment behaviour, i.e. are they likely to pay or not. This is wholly distinct from a person's ability to pay, which is what a credit score helps to show. A person can have plenty of money, but no intention to pay. This can be caused by many things, such as a deliberate fraud or a disorganised approach to bill payment. Either way, knowing upfront whether a person is likely to pay gives you the ability to interact with them accordingly.
Related content:
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient »
Q: So, you screen for fraud – is that all you do?
A: Preventing first party fraud is a key strength, but our codes can be used to add significant bottom-line value right across the customer lifecycle. Our name shows our heritage, the original solution was built to identify deliberate fraud, i.e. people who take goods and services with no intent to pay. We've since worked with clients in finding many more and powerful applications. The solution is more accurately described as a predictor of an individual’s intent to pay - and hence Fraudscreen is used throughout the customer lifecycle, from acquisition screening, to customer data mining to collections and late recoveries. One of the defining characteristics of the Fraudscreen coding is its ability to discriminate through time.
Q: So, you’re a data modelling outfit?
A: No. Fraudscreen codes can be used to enhance statistical models and we do offer analytic consulting, but our primary role is to provide clients with the means to enhance their business processes by enabling decisions to be made based on payment intent codes.
Q: Isn’t this just the same as credit scoring?
A: No. Fraudscreen coding provides a different perspective to credit data, in that it identifies intent to pay, rather than the ability to pay. The two are complementary. Fraudscreen often has greatest impact on marginal credit decisions close to the credit score cut-off and also on what the industry calls thin files, where there is insufficient credit data available.
Related content:
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient » Back to top
Q: Where do you get your data from?
A: Fraudscreen’s unique coding solutions are created from a blind dataset, compiled from transactional data contributed by members of a closed user group. Fraudscreen holds exclusive vendor rights to this dataset. Effectively, our codes are derived by referencing a vast pool of external data in order to gain the most extensive view possible.
Q: How does your coding actually work?
A: Payment transaction data is combined and referenced to create Fraudscreen’s proprietary coding structure which can be used to categorise any retail sales and credit risk process. This applies right across the customer lifecycle, whether it is to code risk at point of customer acquisition or to prioritise whom to call in collections. For example, our Classic product creates 32 individual codes to enable granular categorisation. The codes are then used in accordance with your company’s individual business process, in effect a unique template of codes is created specific to your requirements. In order to tailor the codes for use in a particular application, the individual codes are often aggregated into colour codes, creating a ‘traffic light’ system, ranked from best to worst.
Related content:
- See how this works across the customer lifecycle by reading about our Products »
Q: How come no one else has access to this data?
A: The data is unique to Fraudscreen because the data contributors are part of our closed user group. In addition, the client permissions are not in place to allow the data to be provided to data controllers (the normal source of data in the marketplace), which is why Fraudscreen is set up as a data processor.
Q: Is this compliant with the Data Protection Act?
A: Yes. The Fraudscreen approach was designed from the outset with significant input from the Office of the Information Commissioner. We're also members of the DMA, and as such are bound by their code of conduct.
Q: How do I find out what information you hold on me?
A: We don't hold any personal data. We blind reference data that is held by organisations with whom consumers have an existing relationship. The only data item created by Fraudscreen is a code. The code is powerful in the context of how it is used in a specific business process. Fraudscreen’s role as data processor means we cannot amend the contributor data in any way. So, whilst Fraudscreen can provide you with your code, it is the users of the codes and the original data suppliers who are able to provide information as to how they interpret the code and what data they hold, respectively.
Q: Can’t I just model payment intent from the data I already hold on my customers?
A: No. Your own customer data will only provide payment history for current and lapsed customers, and then only in relation to their interactions with your organisation. To confidently predict future payment intentions you need greater insight into their payment behaviour elsewhere in the market. This is especially true when attempting to predict the payment intent of lapsed customers (who may not have traded with you for a long time) and of cold prospects. In collections and late recovery applications the same holds true, using external data on payment intent greatly enhances your ability to predict successful recoveries and adamant non-payers. By using transactional information from contributing members, Fraudscreen is able to identify payment behaviour for the same individuals across more than one customer database, providing a much more accurate picture.
Related content:
- See how this works across the customer lifecycle by reading about our Products »
Q: What’s the point of coding payment intent when someone is in arrears?
A: Knowing whom to call first is a crucial element of any collections activity. A late payment may be the result of a simple oversight rather than any deliberate attempt to avoid payment. Identifying those customers who have the intent to pay is therefore extremely valuable in planning your approach. The appropriate treatment strategies can be used to support valuable customers through temporary crises. Equally, knowing who has little, or no, intent to pay is also important. You can take tougher, earlier action, and, if necessary, free up resources by accelerating recoveries activity earlier in the process.
Related content:
- Find out about Fraudscreen's solutions in Collections & Recoveries »
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient »
Q: How does what you do apply to marketing?
A: Fraudscreen codes have an important role to play in outbound, inbound and customer marketing activity. For example, with outbound marketing, the codes can be used in three ways:
- To screen out negative data prior to marketing spend, identifying and suppressing those targets with poor intent to pay.
- To expand marketing volumes by widening the window either side of a credit score to include identified good payers.
- To maximise revenues by cross selling/up-selling and offering differentiated incentives to those with excellent intent to pay.
For inbound marketing , the codes can be used as a gateway by identifying whom to reject and whom to cross and up-sell, typically in RealTime for use online or on the telephone. For customer marketing, Fraudscreen has developed a specific product called HouseFile. This allows you to mine deeper into your lapsed data, identifying the best codes with the greatest payment potential. It can also be used to identify those existing customers demonstrating good payment behaviour elsewhere, giving you greater confidence to generate additional revenues through tailored incentives and product offerings.
Related content:
- See how this works across the customer lifecycle by reading about our Products »
Q: How does what you do apply to risk management?
A: Risk management is a business process that lends itself very well to Fraudscreen coding. Using Fraudscreen RealTime, you can effect a segmented approach to the control of retail non-payment risks, a subset of consumer counterparty risk.
Related content:
- Find out about Fraudscreen's solutions in Collections & Recoveries »
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient »
Q: How does what you do apply to collections and recoveries?
A: More often than not those who are in collections have passed a credit score as part of the application process, even though this may have been some time ago. Similarly, many lenders try to quantify credit risks as the customer relationship unfolds, using behaviour scoring and similar techniques. Despite this creative use of internal and credit bureau data, write-offs continue, and in some cases have never been higher. Assessing and segmenting collections and recoveries cases on the basis of payment intent using Fraudscreen DebtCollect codes provides an important source for this new thinking. Mindful of the heavy costs companies have incurred in using credit bureau data and behaviour scoring in collections, Fraudscreen DebtCollect provides a highly cost-effective starting point to segmenting overdue debts. And, unlike other techniques, it is an effective way of segmenting late recovery debt as well as early stage collections.
Related content:
- Find out about Fraudscreen's solutions in Collections & Recoveries »
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient »
Q: How does Fraudscreen benefit consumer credit applications?
A: You can use Fraudscreen Classic codes, in conjunction with credit bureau data and credit scoring if you use them, to improve the discrimination of your new credit application process. This will allow you to take on more accounts that intend to pay, and to reject accounts that won’t pay.
Related content:
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient » Back to top
Q: How does Fraudscreen benefit pre-collections processes?
A: Pre-collections is the process by which accounts with a high risk of future default, but not yet in arrears, are reviewed to improve the chances of collection if they default. The review might include ensuring that data resources, such as employer details and phone numbers, are complete. In some cases, lenders obtain bureau data on exposure to other lenders debts for these accounts, and even contact the customer to offer friendly help. The problem has been the high level of 'false positives' in this process. Often the customer does not default, so the pre-collections process was an un-necessary expense. Fraudscreen Housefile codes provide an economical and effective way to improve the precision of pre-collections processes.
Related content:
- Find out about Fraudscreen's solutions in Collections & Recoveries »
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient » Back to top
Q: How does Fraudscreen help Debt Recovery Agencies (DCAs)?
A: DCAs have not been well served by existing data suppliers. Often, when they obtain written off and charged off accounts from their clients, the records are sparse and incomplete. Credit bureau data, if available at reasonable cost, tends to have limited attributes for such accounts. Finally, the DCA does not have the account for long enough to develop a worthwhile payment history itself. No wonder DCAs have often found segmenting accounts and differential treatments an unproductive route to improving recovery rates. Fraudscreen DebtCollect coding provides a welcome answer to many of these problems. Its unique approach means you need only a name, address and postcode to obtain the Fraudscreen code that will drive an effective segmented approach to debt recovery. And, Fraudscreen’s proprietary address matching software allows many fraudulently misleading addresses to be matched to the correct debtor. Costs are crucial to DCAs, with Fraudscreen DebtCollect’s pay-as-you-use tariff, there are no development costs or delays in obtaining the codes.
Related content:
- Find out about Fraudscreen's solutions in Collections & Recoveries »
- Discussion paper: Payment intent; risk's missing ingredient »
Q: What about Treating the Customer Fairly (TCF); is Fraudscreen fair?
A: Yes. By using Fraudscreen codes to assist lending decisions and different collections approaches, lenders are able to show evidence-based reasons why they have treated customers in different ways. Fraudscreen codes are based on a wide variety of external payment transactions from a variety of different sources. This is a far fairer way of determining the strategy for a particular customer than approaches based on a single lender’s or retailer’s experience.
Q: How much does it cost?
A: Pricing is dependent upon the number of transactions (codes), please contact us on 0207 636 5724 for further information.
Q: How do I start to use Fraudscreen in practice?
A: Generally, Fraudscreen undertake a Data Review to prove that the Fraudscreen codes will discriminate for the particular business process in question, whether that is acquisition risk assessment, or collections prioritisation, etc. This review gives you powerful proof for any business case and will create a template for use of the codes and will be the basis on which decisions are taken. The codes are normally used and stored within the relevant systems – CRM, application processing and so on. Code delivery from Fraudscreen can either be via a batch process or in RealTime.
Related content:
- Request your Data Review »
- Read about real Fraudscreen applications in our Case Studies »
Q: How long does it take to code a database?
A: We can code up to 1000 records per second. The coding system is extremely flexible and quick, providing either batch or real-time processing. Our products are delivered in three ways:
- Ad-hoc batches, dependent upon volume, can be coded in less than 48 hours.
- Alternatively, for ongoing inbound marketing a daily automated batch can be coded in 3-5 hours.
- The Fraudscreen RealTime solution, ideal for website or call centre inbound traffic has the capacity to code up to 1,000 records per second.
Related content:
- Read more about our Product Delivery »
- Read about a RealTime application in our Case Studies » Back to top
