Margins and Paddings Update

Five years ago, I began volunteering as an Experian Ambassador, teaching personal finance to local high school students. It is so rewarding to share my credit knowledge with young people, and to see their eyes light up when they understand how credit works. I ended up starting my career at Experian 26 years ago because my passion for credit runs in my blood. I was raised in a household where reputation was everything to my father. The idea of having a good name, a good reputation and a good credit score was drilled into me. So, when Experian created the Ambassador Program to promote financial literacy in local communities through employee volunteers, I jumped at the chance to participate. At the time, I was an Account Executive and knew that for most consumers, credit is an obscure subject. I thought this program would be a great opportunity to apply my expertise and educate people in my community about the importance of taking their financial reputation seriously. As an Ambassador, I gave my first presentation on financial literacy to high school students, and the experience was so rewarding that I immediately contacted my son’s high school to see if I could teach the same class to his classmates. The program has grown to where I now go to the school twice a year, teaching the entire student body of 4,000 students about how they can responsibly build their credit. For each class, I share personal stories and anecdotal examples that are relatable to them. For example, to explain how credit scores affect consumers, I ask every student to think of number between 350 and 800. I then pick three volunteers to come to the stage – one who chose a number in the low range, one from the mid-range and third from the higher range. I then ask those three kids to agree on the dream car they would buy. Once they agree on the make and model, we talk about how the price of the car is the same for everyone, but that their credit score determines the loan financing. Someone with a higher credit score will pay much less over the life of a car loan than someone with a lower score. That’s the moment my students’ eyes light up, because they finally understand how credit works. Over the years, I’ve had kids come up to me in grocery stores and thank me for teaching them about credit. One young man in particular came up to me at a local farmer’s market, beaming. “I remember when you taught me about credit scores,” he said. “Because of you, I was able to save money, get a secured card, build my credit and buy my first car.” His pride was infectious. Credit has an impact in everyone’s life at some point. By speaking to students at a young age, in terms and language they understand, I’ve helped countless students successfully and safely build credit to help them reach their first financial milestones. I am proud of the opportunity I have been given at Experian to help young people to take control of their financial futures.

I’m constantly amazed at how Experian gets to uncover and bring to life the data that really matters. By partnering with the National Literacy Trust to analyze different data sets, we uncovered a widespread literacy crisis in England. A while back, Experian was approached by the National Literacy Trust in England, asking us to collect information to help them better understand how far-reaching literacy problems are in England. Using data from Experian, the National Literacy Trust and the 2011 census, our data analytics team compared data sets against social factors that are closely associated with low literacy levels, such as education, income and unemployment rates.  Through this in-depth analysis, we were able to create a literacy vulnerability score for every single electoral ward and parliamentary constituency in England. We found that 86 percent of all English constituencies have entrenched problems with literacy. What was most surprising was how far-reaching the problem was across the country. I guess I had assumed, as most would, that in the more affluent areas where there are good levels of education, higher incomes and higher employment rates, children would have a good relationship with books. We found, however, that it doesn’t matter what community you live in, or how affluent or deprived the area is – literacy issues can affect all of us. While the initial reaction by the public has been one of shock, I really think this study was something England needed to help the next generation avoid the same problems. Working alongside the National Literacy Trust, we’re leveraging this data to raise awareness within the government. Early in February 2017, we supported an event for Members of Parliament (MPs) to highlight how the issue may affect their constituencies, using a ranking table that shows which areas are the most affected. You could say this literacy issue is a bit of a crisis, and MPs would now agree. In my role at Experian, I frequently look at what we call “societal impact stories” that highlight how Experian is engaged in local communities. What I love about my job is getting to see how all the powerful information we have on hand is being used to lay the foundations for others to transform lives and local communities for the better.  While there is still much work to be done to solve the literacy issue in England, I’m constantly amazed at how we at Experian get to uncover and bring to life the data that really matters.  

Bernard Marr, who LinkedIn recently ranked as one of the top 10 business influencers in the world (just behind Bill Gates and Richard Branson), recently published a story on Forbes about how Experian is using machine learning to cut mortgage application times to just a few days. In this article, Experian’s Global CIO, Barry Libenson, discusses how Experian is well-positioned to pioneer technology in this field, due to the fact that banks, insurers and public sector bodies all routinely come to it for its data. “Now the large financial institutions don’t want you to dictate to them how they consume information, they want to tell you how they want to consume it, and you have to deliver it to them in that way. So they can say ‘hey, Experian, we have a simple question we want to ask and we expect a simple response, and we want it in real-time, and we want to be able to get it 24 hours a day from anywhere in the world.'” Check out the full article: How Experian Is Using Big Data and Machine Learning to Cut Mortgage Applicatoin Times To a Few Days