Bulgarian National Bank has adopted changes to the rules on the credit register, providing that from October 1 2009, loans given by non-bank consumer lending firms offering easy loans and leasing houses will have to be recorded in the credit register.
 
The move is intended to broaden the database available to banks about peoples’ financial positions.
 
Until now, only banks and financial institutions, their subsidiaries and local branches of foreign banks were obliged to provide this information, Sega and Dnevnik reported.
 
The BNB changes the situation in which banks and non-bank lenders were mutually unaware of loans taken by their respective clients.
 
Loan consultancy Creditex told Dnevnik that the change would mean that customers with good credit records would get loans more easily. It would improve financial discipline, Creditex said.
 
Easy Credit managing director Nedelcho Spasov said that financial institutions that had long-term interests in the market would make the required software and procedural changes to meet the requirements and obtain the right of access to information in the credit register.
 
TBI Credit executive director Valentin Galabov said that credit history would become an increasingly important factor in loan decisions and in reducing the risk of bad loans.
 
BNB said that the change would enable lenders to achieve faster and more accurate assessments of credit risk and indebtedness, and this would prevent hindering the growth of lending to the real economy.