Home Credit Philippines targets 10M users by yearend

FINANCING COMPANY Home Credit Philippines aims to reach 10 million users by the end of 2023 after reaching 9.3 million last year.

“Our goal of a financially empowered Philippines comes true every year, one customer at a time. In our 10 years of service in the country, we aim to empower 10 million customers by the end of 2023 and continue to serve more Filipinos in the years to come,” Home Credit Philippines Chief Executive Officer David Minol said in a statement on Thursday.

Home Credit Philippines Chief Sales Officer Puneet Suneja said at a briefing on Thursday that they believe the 10 million target can be reached despite the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (BSP) continued tightening.

“Even after the interest rate increase by the BSP, Home Credit has actually not increased interest rates on any of our products over the last few years. In fact, we’ve increased the number of products available with 0% interest because we truly do [want] for our customers to be able to afford things and be realized with our product,” he said.

“Basically, it is our responsibility as a lender to provide loans to customers who can’t afford to pay in this situation,” Home Credit Philippines Treasurer Zdenek Jankovsky added.

The BSP last month hiked benchmark rates by 50 basis points (bps) for a second straight meeting, bringing its policy rate to 6%.

The central bank now raised borrowing costs by 400 bps since May 2022 to help bring down elevated prices. Its next meeting is on March 23.

Home Credit Philippines Chief Marketing Officer Sheila Paul said they likewise aim to innovate their financial literacy efforts.

“We have people nationwide of 8,000 sales agents and what we hope is that they will in their own way be financial literacy ambassadors,” she said during the same briefing.

“What we’re trying to do is equip our own people, our own employees, as well as the community and organization partners and students, to be able to do financial literacy within their own methods,” Ms. Paul added.

Home Credit Philippines entered the country in 2013 and is licensed as a financing company and supervised by the Securities and Exchange Commission and by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.

The company, which provides buy now, pay later or BNPL services, offers product loans and cash loans processed through the My Home Credit app.

It said in the statement that it has disbursed over 1.8 million in cash loans to date, with its partner stores now at 15,000 across 75 provinces.

Home Credit Philippines also offers protection products for electronic devices and home belongings, as well as solutions for managing payments and unlimited telemedicine service, death and accident coverage, and medical reimbursement. — AMCS