CLEARWATER, Fla.-There is plenty of value to be had in the debit and credit card data credit unions capture every day. Quantifying it, however, isn't so easy.
Bill Lehman, VP-portfolio consulting services with CSCU, noted, "It's important to have processors that can help. It would be a challenge for most credit unions - not to get the data, but to analyze it. I think they are capable of getting the scores. It's then - what do you do with it?"
Mitch Raymond, VP of product development for TNB Card Services, in Dallas, agreed.
"I really have not heard any credit unions doing this one their own," Raymond said, adding TNB offers client CUs tools to help with the data analysis.
"At the end of the day, you know who is using [the card], what they are using it for. In terms of complexity of what you use it for, it depends on how complex you want it to be," he said. "And there are no restrictions as far as data that you already own."
Indeed, he suggested the only restrictions are a credit union's mindset. "How you target your program is only limited by your own creativity," he said. "It depends on what your angle is and what you want to achieve."
Lehman encourages credit unions to study credit scoring and data mining as a way to learn about their members' spending history.
"It can also be used for charge-off control, delinquency prevention, and for re-issuing criteria," Lehman said. "Utilize the experience of your processor."
