Understanding Creditworthiness and the Bonify App: Answering Questions and Examining Benefits and Risks

Answer questions

Stand date: July 22, 2023.

Authors:
Julian Beimdiecke

In the future, users should be able to check their own creditworthiness via the Bonify app from Schufa – free of charge, at any time. But the offer has downsides.

Whether when taking out a loan or before signing a rental agreement: almost everyone in Germany has had to prove their creditworthiness at some point. As a rule, this is done via a Schufa report, in which the relevant data and information can be found. With the Bonify app, there is now another option – in a system that is often criticized for its opacity.

What does that actually mean: creditworthiness?

Credit agencies – i.e. private companies that collect information about consumers – determine how creditworthy private individuals are. The largest and best-known credit agency is Schufa, but there are also companies like Creditreform or Crif.

So if credit agencies like the Schufa estimate the probability that a citizen will repay the loan that he has taken out, his Schufa score increases. If this score is high, the credit rating is good; if it is low, the credit rating is low.

What the Schufa makes their assessments dependent on exactly, they do not announce – officially, so that the system cannot be manipulated.

What can the Bonify app do now?

With the Bonify app, users will be able to see how Schufa assesses their creditworthiness at any time and free of charge. If a negative entry is saved, there is a push notification.

Users should also have the opportunity to improve their own score – if they allow Bonify to look into their own account for 90 days and then agree that Bonify may pass this data on to the Schufa. All these functions should be available by 2024 at the latest.

How do you get a Schufa report?

Consumers have the option of contacting Schufa itself or a third party to obtain Schufa information. Once a year you can get the free information in paper form, which should be treated sensitively according to Schufa. In addition, there is the possibility of ordering information for a fee, which, according to Schufa, is suitable for safe transfer to third parties – and costs almost 30 euros. These options for obtaining Schufa information should continue to exist despite the Bonify app.

How are Bonify and Schufa related?

At the end of 2022, Schufa bought the Bonify financial platform. Schufa boss Tanja Birkholz says on Tagesschau.de: “It is important for us to make it clear that Schufa and Bonify are related to each other as parent and subsidiary companies, but both are and will remain legally independent – also through separate data rooms.” Therefore, no data would be exchanged between Schufa and Bonify without explicit consent. But it is interesting: Bonify arranges, among other things, loans for which no credit bureau information is required.

What do experts say about the Bonify app?

The Bonify app must be measured against the General Data Protection Regulation and the principles for the processing of personal data listed therein – that is what Bremen’s data protection officer Imke Sommer says about the offer. Corina Lechner from the Bremen Debt Aid is clearer – she advises against using the app.

With such offers, one should always ask oneself: Who really benefits from them? One must not forget that companies like Schufa trade in data. And they could also get these via the app.

Corina Lechner, Debtor Aid Bremen

Caution is therefore required – also because it is not transparent what happens to which data. “For example, I couldn’t estimate whether frequent inquiries in the app would generally worsen my creditworthiness,” she points out. The Federal Association of Consumer Centers also said: It is not critical to see your own creditworthiness via the Bonify app. However, the association also advises against account access.

This topic in the program:
Bremen Zwei, July 18, 2023, the morning, 8.40 a.m