Login
ISCOVER
Eighty-six of 88 banks have been found to have data quality issues in their open banking data for home loans, according to analysis by fintech Moneycatcha.
A new analysis of home loan product reference data has revealed that 97 per cent of Australian banks could improve at least one aspect of their open banking data disclosures under Australia’s Consumer Data Right (CDR).
To continue reading the rest of this article, please log in.
Looking for more benefits? Become a Premium Member.
Create free account to get unlimited news articles and more!
Looking for more benefits? Become a Premium Member.
Currently, banks are required to provide information on all the products provided by them such as interest rates, product eligibility criteria, and pricing information, as well as fees and charges.
When published according to the standards, open banking data can support brokers and their clients in choosing a competitive home loan.
However, in a new report, titled Digging Deeper to Unearth Open Banking’s Hidden Gem: An updated Product Reference Data scorecard, it has been revealed the vast majority of banks are still beleaguered by data errors.
After reviewing over 2,000 residential home loan products provided by lenders via their Product Reference Data (PRD) APIs, Perth-based fintech Moneycatcha revealed 86 of the 88 banks reviewed had data quality issues with at least one home loan product.
Moneycatcha – which harnesses home loan product reference data for its flagship Stryd Product Repository (a real-time product and pricing database used by mortgage brokers to find borrowers the best loan) – found a total of 3,101 data quality issues across all products, with 57 per cent of products having one issue and the rest having between two and seven data issues.
The top five data quality issues related to fundamental mortgage attributes are as follows:
-
Loan-to-value ratio (LVR)
-
Interest rate
-
Repayment type
-
Loan purpose
-
Loan amount
Given the issues, the fintech has referred 1,431 products to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), in some cases, more than once.
Almost 30 per cent of lenders reported to the ACCC had data quality issues in up to half of their home loan products, according to the report (released under its Stryd brand name).
Speaking of the findings, Ruth Hatherley, Moneycatcha’s founder & CEO (and member of the Data Standards Advisory Committee), said: “We’re sharing insights with the ACCC to highlight crucial aspects of data management practices for the greater good.
“Sometimes the data is missing, or it’s in the wrong field or format, and sometimes it’s inconsistent with what’s publicly available on the bank’s website.
“That doesn’t mean the data is junk or the standards are ineffective, rather there’s work to be done to unearth the value of product reference data, because it really is open banking’s hidden gem.”
Hatherley added that the Stryd Product Repository provides the opportunity to “dig deeper into the data with thousands of lines of code and business rules” so brokers can “make accurate product and pricing offers and help Australian consumers find a better home loan”.
“As the data standards refine, we will see ongoing uplifts in the quality of product data being published by the banks and also non-bank lenders as they come into CDR from 2026 onwards,” she concluded.
New CDR regime unveiled
In April 2023, the ACCC identified product reference data quality issues as a CDR enforcement priority and, in September 2024, it published the results of a targeted compliance review of 20 banking sector data holders that resulted in 11 data holders committing to remediation.
This included HSBC Bank Australia Limited (HSBC), which paid $33,000 in penalties in April 2024 after the competition watchdog issued two infringement notices to the non-major bank for alleged CDR rule contraventions.
Given that the CDR has been plagued with delays and errors in data reporting and low consumer take-up, the federal government has been undertaking a ‘reset’ of the open banking system.
In November 2024, the Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services, Stephen Jones MP, announced three core changes to make it easier for consumers to use the CDR.
-
Simplifying the consent process and streamlining requirements for providers. This would be done by allowing consents to be bundled, so consumers can provide multiple consents through one single action. The government said this would improve the consumer experience and increase uptake.
-
Removing barriers for banks by simplifying requirements that apply when an accredited bank seeks data from a consumer. This change has been made after the government said that the previous process was “complex and confusing for consumers, often resulting in them dropping out”.
-
Supporting innovation by extending a trial of CDR‑enabled energy products to 24 months (up from 12 months) and 2,000 customers (up from 1,000). Treasury said that the expansion will ensure the trial period supports the unique nature of energy contracts.
The CDR is expected to expand to non-bank lending in early 2025 and be operational by mid-2026.
Sharing obligations for product data will apply from 13 July 2026, followed by consumer data sharing obligations in four phases from 9 November 2026 until 13 September 2027. It will begin with the largest non-bank lenders and non-complex data requests.
As such, new rules were released for consultation last year.
JOIN THE DISCUSSION