Lending advertisements are pervasive, consumers lament that marketing information is difficult to block; interest rates are too high, fees are not transparent, consumers complain about the weak pre-loan prompts; induce advanced consumption, excessive lending, consumer complaints "routine" identification is difficult. What "thunder" have consumers stepped on when borrowing loans online? What kind of Internet consumer loan service are you looking forward to?
Recently, the Nandu Digital Finance Innovation and Compliance Research Group launched the "3·15" digital finance series of polls, and the data shows that short video information flow advertising, inducing loan applications in the form of coupons, etc., is the most disgusting loan marketing method for consumers. According to Internet complaint data and poll data, among the more than 30 mainstream Internet consumer loan retail brands, Home Credit Consumer Finance, Xiaoying Card Loan and Tongcheng Financial Services have a higher number of consumer complaints.
In fact, the financial regulatory authorities have repeatedly stressed the need to prevent consumer loan "routine" marketing and remind consumers to stay away from the trap of excessive lending marketing.
Disgust: Short video advertising marketing
On the eve of "3.15" this year, in response to the topic of consumer loans, the Nandu Digital Finance Innovation and Compliance Research Group launched a half-month poll to consumers, and a total of 2048 valid questionnaires were recovered.
In which channels do consumers often see loan ads? According to the poll results, respondents most often receive loan ads on various search engines, browser apps and portals, accounting for more than 65%; the second largest channel is the short video platform, 60% of the respondents said they have received loan advertisements when brushing videos; in addition, more than half of the respondents have brushed loan advertisements on social platforms such as circle of friends and Weibo. In addition to the above three main channels, more than 30% of the people who have been pushed loan advertisements on the apps for taxi and cycling travel have been "pop-up windows" on the apps for online shopping and takeaway, and more than 30% of the people have been "pop-up" loan advertisements on the apps for online shopping and takeaway. It is worth noting that the number of respondents who have received loan advertisements for education and training and medical aesthetic scenes has reached 15% and 10% respectively.
Ubiquitous lending ads often overwhelm consumers. More than half of respondents believe it is most difficult to accept borrowing ads in the process of brushing short videos. The second most disgusted is "coupons induce loan application", more than 45% of respondents said that some loan advertisements appear in the form of pop-up windows in the form of coupons, lottery, etc., often in the daily use of apps such as taxis, cycling, borrowing and returning charging treasures, online shopping, and ordering takeaways. The third is the loan advertisement in the WeChat circle of friends.
In the view of the surveyed consumers, the phenomenon of encouraging advanced consumption at low interest rates and giving priority to the use of consumer credit products when inducing payment is more common, and it is also a marketing method that they cannot tolerate, accounting for about 60% of these two categories.
In fact, in the actual marketing scenario, these problems often appear nested, such as ordering a takeaway, being induced by coupons to open a "first use and then pay" consumer credit products; matching the loan amount after opening, inducing consumers to "withdraw" money with ultra-low interest rate slogans; and then every time you order takeaway, you automatically help users choose to pay for the payment method of "first use and pay later".
Distress: Inability to actively block marketing messages
What bothers consumers even more is that if they click on a loan ad once, they will be recommended more of these ads after that. Poll data shows that nearly 70% of respondents said they were troubled by consumer loan advertising, of which 20% of consumers said they were "completely unacceptable" and did not want to receive online loan advertising recommendations, while the rest of the respondents hoped to reduce marketing information.
However, even if unsubscribe or click "not interested" and "report" ads, these consumer loan sales SMS or marketing ads will still make a comeback, from the questionnaire data, more than 90% of consumers said that after unsubscribing will still be harassed by advertising, of which 40% of respondents reported that active blocking has no effect, and another 60% of respondents said that after making active blocking actions, they will no longer receive similar advertisements for a period of time, but they will reappear after a period of time.
Surprise: The result of receiving the coupon was checked by the credit
I thought I could "shed wool", but I was guided to apply for a loan. According to the experience of researchers in the Nandu research group, on a certain online car travel App, for half a month, almost every day to open the App was pushed by the pop-up window to receive the advertisement of coupons, if you click "collect", you jump to the application for a loan page.
It is worth noting that the above-mentioned "coupon routine" is a common advertising model used by many large Internet financial platforms. Among them, many platform advertising pages replace the user's sensitive words "loan" and "loan" with words such as "receive quota" and "test quota", which is easier for consumers to ignore the risks behind them. Follow the advertising link guidelines, fill in some basic information, brush your face, click to collect, if the consumer is defenseless, or lack of relevant knowledge, it will easily become a new user of the platform converted from this advertisement.
What many consumers do not realize is that if they try to approve the loan amount multiple times, it is actually equivalent to authorizing the cooperative financial institutions of the platform to inquire about their credit information. It is equivalent to every time you try to get a coupon, you will be checked once, and the personal credit report will leave a record of each "pre-loan approval". For consumers who have not passed the approval, it does not matter whether "coupons" or "free orders" can be obtained, and they have also been checked for credit.
Some consumers raised concerns: if you often click on this link to "get the quota", will it affect your personal credit status because you have been checked for credit many times? In this regard, a credit manager of South China Joint Stock Bank told Nandu reporter that in the actual loan business approval process, if it is found that the borrower has been repeatedly consulted by banks, microfinance companies, guarantee companies and other credit records cooperated by the online lending platform, but no new loans have been approved, it may indeed be considered by the bank that the qualifications are not good enough, and there is a suspicion of multi-headed lending.
For this kind of "hidden danger", consumers may be difficult to notice, the Central University of Finance and Economics China Internet Economy Research Institute deputy dean Ouyang Rihui suggested that there may be such a "industry unspoken rule" in some banks to do credit approval, which reminds consumers must pay attention to protect their credit, learn more about the relevant basic knowledge, do not be confused by the preferential routines on the Internet, for small concessions and damage to personal credit, more than worth the loss.
Helplessness: Insufficient tips for key links before platform lending
When the Internet financial platform promotes consumer loan products, it often highlights the cheapness of the price and the convenience of the application, and the Nandu research group also found in the survey that when borrowers use these products, they do not pay enough attention to some details of the products.
From the perspective of consumer borrowing habits, the most concerned product-related information before lending is about personal information and expenses. According to the questionnaire results, about 50% of consumers said that they would pay attention to what personal information they needed to fill in before applying, whether to charge a guarantee fee and the level of the guarantee fee, and 44% of the respondents said that they would understand the interest rate fee, ranking second in the attention.
So when consumers apply for and use consumer loan products, will they carefully check the terms of the contract? According to the survey data, 40% of respondents said that they "will pay attention to the page prompt information, but do not carefully review the contract", and less than 13% of the respondents said that they will carefully review all the information and take screenshots and save the contract information.
In addition, it is not difficult to see from the time it takes to understand the relevant information that most consumers do not fully understand the product information and loan contracts. According to the data, nearly 80% of respondents spent less than 15 minutes to understand the contracts and information related to lending, of which 45% took less than 10 minutes. This also leaves a lot of hidden dangers for consumers to protect their rights in the later stage.
Some insiders pointed out that this is actually due to the problem of incomplete product information disclosure on some platforms, it is necessary for Internet financial platforms to strengthen the reminder of key information, and the industry's financial literacy education for consumers also needs to be strengthened. Su Xiaorui, a senior analyst in the financial industry at Analysys, told Nandu reporter that financial product information needs to be clearly disclosed to borrowers before lending, such as interest rate range, financial product providers, etc. Are basic requirements, if not clear and non-standardized, it will cause trouble to financial consumers.
According to the data, more than half of the respondents believe that the key links such as the signing, authorization, and contract signing of the platform before the loan are insufficient; more than 40% of the respondents complained that the interest and other expenses were not clearly displayed, and the complete contract could not be seen before the loan; and nearly 40% of the respondents said that after the loan was successful, the contract was difficult to find.
Mind: Collect contact details from friends and family
The survey shows that consumers have a weak sense of trust in the information security of Internet consumer loan products, more than 80% of respondents are worried about the leakage of personal information after applying for Internet consumer loan products, nearly 40% of respondents said they were "very worried", and 44% of respondents said they were "more worried".
Specific to the category of personal sensitive information, the platform requires the collection of "friend's name and mobile phone number" and "colleague's name and mobile phone number" which is the most concerned by consumers. Another data in the poll results is also worth paying attention to, most of the respondents who have overdue collection experience said that they have encountered "phone calls, text messages, WeChat bombing relatives and friends for collection" or "verbal harassment" and "personal information is disclosed". In fact, third-party collection agencies entrusted by some platforms often appear such "violent collection" behaviors that are suspected of infringing on personal privacy, and such complaints and disputes are also commonly reported in the news.
According to the evaluation of the mainstream Internet consumer loan platform by the researchers of the research group, for the purpose of post-loan management and collection, most platforms will require borrowers to fill in the names and mobile phone numbers of 1-2 immediate family members during the application process, and a small number of platforms will require borrowers to fill in the names and contact information of family, friends and colleagues at the same time, called "emergency contacts", and even some platforms are forced to obtain the borrower's address book authority and read the address book.
Where is the boundary of the platform's collection of personal information? In the view of a lawyer in the Internet finance industry in Guangzhou, "the collection of personal information must first follow the principle of 'minimum necessity', and whether the platform practice in practice conforms to the minimum necessity principle of the individual insurance law deserves further discussion." It is necessary to clearly provide users with information authorization channels, solve the 'informed-consent' problem of personal information collection, and legality, legitimacy and necessity should run through the entire process of data collection. ”
Regarding the issue of the platform's outsourced collection agency, it can be seen from the pre-loan contract that most of the platform's agreements have similar clauses saying, "You agree that we have the right to disclose your breach information to cooperative law firms, collection agencies, and emergency contacts that we believe can convey information to you." The above-mentioned industry lawyer pointed out that this clause is actually to allow the borrower to authorize and agree to the "emergency contact" filled in by the platform and the collection agency to contact the borrower for collection. "The personal information collector here is not the actual user of the data, which involves the issue of the flow of the borrower's personal information to the external cooperative institution, whether such a 'one-time authorization' is reasonable, how to solve the problem of 're-authorization consent' when the information flows again, and the management of the collection behavior of the platform to the outsourced collection agency, the details of these processes are still difficulties and challenges facing the industry." It is expressed as such.
Complaints: Home Credit, Xiaoying and other complaints are the highest
On which platforms have consumers stepped on the "thunder"? Based on the Internet complaint platform and poll data, the research group combed and found that the top five types with the highest number of complaints included "suspected usury", violent collection, false publicity and improper marketing, user information leakage, procedures and guarantee fees.
The research group selected 30 mainstream Internet consumer loan retailers with high popularity in the consumer questionnaire to count the number of consumer complaints on the complaint platform, and found that the three companies & brands with higher complaints were: Home Credit Consumer Finance had the highest number of complaints, compared with other platforms, its complaint volume was far ahead; followed by Small Win Card Loan, and Tongcheng Financial Services under Tongcheng Travel also had more.
Combing found that for Home Credit Consumer Finance, some complainants said that because they were recommended to open VIP members before applying for loans, they paid membership fees, resulting in the comprehensive cost of their loans rising. Another consumer complained about the "false publicity" of Home Credit Consumer Finance, claiming that after applying for Gitzo VIP membership, it did not obtain a loan, and was recommended for loan products of other "preferred platforms", in fact, the Home Credit platform only diverted consumers to the new platform.
Producer: Nandu Digital Finance Innovation and Compliance Research Group
Data collection and analysis: Nandu reporter Xiong Runmiao Chen Zhuorui
Technical Support:Ke Jianing Zhan Huaping
Design: He Xin