Page 4 - spark_ezine

SPARK 2019 CONFERENCE

PRASANNA’S STORY
Being

Invisible.

Data, Analytics, and Identity together combat information

asymmetry for the 90 million thin or credit invisibles in the US

BY: PRASANNA DHORÉ, CHIEF DATA & ANALYTICS OFFICER

n 1984, at the age of twenty-two I landed in Manhattan,
Kansas after having lived my entire life in India. Two years

later I graduated and relocated to the Northeast to begin
my career. Like most people in their twenties I relied on a
Inetwork of friends and family to get by in life. But despite
this network, life wasn’t always easy.

Like millions of others across the globe, I learned that I was
invisible, credit invisible. In those days to get credit you had
to have credit and none of the banks were willing to take a

ch
ance on me. Even after securing my first credit card, with
only one trade line to my name it took almost ten years to
build up enough credit history to buy a home.

LET’S TAKE A STEP BACK
During my first decade in America I had worked, rented
apartments, and paid a variety of utilities from phone, to water,
to gas. I had proved to be reliable but it didn’t seem to matter.

The reason is simple, in those days lenders relied solely on credit
data and I didn’t exist. All the positive data I had accumulated
wasn’t available. Fast forward to today: there are over 25 million

Americans considered credit invisible. Let’s face it; no one is born
with a credit score whether you’re born in India or the United
States. Additionally there’s another 65 million people considered
thin file or those having very little credit history. In total over 90
million Americans are either thin or invisible; that is a massive

number!

WWW.EQUIFAX.COM/SPARK