MANILA, Philippines – The Credit Information Corp. (CIC) has recognized six financial institutions for being the “first movers” to submit credit data to CIC’s credit information system.
The financial institutions awarded by CIC are composed of six credit card issuers: Metrobank Card Corp., HSBC Philippines, EastWest Banking Corp., the Union Bank of the Philippines, RCBC Bankard and Security Banking Corp., and one cooperative, Taloy Norte Multi-Purpose Cooperative.
CIC president Jaime Garchitorena commended the first movers noting their efforts were not just in compliance with the law. “But in the notion that what we do is good,” Garchitorena added.
Receiving special mention among the earliest submitting entities, Metrobank Card was first among credit card issuers to submit their live data to the CIC’s Credit Information System, while for cooperatives, the first to submit was Taloy Norte Multi-Purpose Cooperative, a member of the National Confederation of Cooperatives (NATCCO) and is based in Baguio.
Garchitorena expressed his gratitude towards the active and enthusiastic participation of Taloy, a cooperative that submitted earliest to CIC’s credit database, almost one year ahead of their scheduled submission date.
“No one expected that cooperatives would submit ahead of time and in lock-step with the universal and commercial banks,” Garchitorena said. “The fact that a cooperative has successfully submitted data to the CIC gives us confidence that the database has value to a broad spectrum of lenders and the process we have created for submitting data does not pose an extraordinary or unreasonable effort.”
Garchitorena said there is a sense of nationalism with the use of credit data being an enabler to inclusive growth.
Republic Act 9510 or the Credit Information System Act establishes a comprehensive and centralized credit information system in the Philippines.
Consequently, the CIC was created to develop and maintain a centralized and reliable credit information system for the collection and dissemination of fair and accurate data relevant to credit.
The centralization is an important tool in improving the overall availability of credit to micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSME), which accounts for 99.6 percent of total registered enterprises in the Philippines.