If you need to apply for a loan whether from a bank or a mobile loan facility in Kenya, most likely your credit status will be checked on CRB. This makes the credit reference bureau play a very important role in Kenya when you want to borrow money.
In case you are wondering, CRB stands for credit reference bureau. They are companies which collect information from different financial institutions such as banks, mobile loan lenders, saccos and utility providers about consumers. With this information, they create a credit profile about you. This profile can then be accessed by lenders to see whether or not you are a risk to lend to.
That’s right, CRB’s collect data from companies you pay bills to such as KPLC, Safaricom and Nairobi Water company just to name a few.
This credit information is then used to create a profile about you that lenders can access to gauge how credit-worthy you are.
So, how can you get listed on CRB.
What does it mean to be listed on CRB? Being listed on CRB can either be in a positive or negative way depending on how well you have been making loan repayments.
A positive listing means that you are paying back loans without a problem i.e. you are not defaulting on servicing your credit.
Negative listing means you are not paying your loans consistently and that you are in default. This is what is referred to as being blacklisted on CRB. Follow these steps if you need to remove your name from CRB blacklist and be able to borrow loans again.
To get your CRB credit report, you will need to register with a CRB provider and then download the report from their website. Follow the steps below to get your credit report from Metropol
Getting a credit report is free for the most part. All you have to do is pay a registration fee with your CRB of choice. This fee ranges from 50 Ksh to 100 Ksh.
A consumer is entitled to one free credit report per calendar year. After that, the bureau will charge you.
This refers to a service offered by credit bureaus and it’s called Creditinfo Monitoring. It allows you to keep up to date with changes to your credit history. This means you get to learn who has listed you negatively or positively on CRB.
It’s advisable that you monitor your credit status at least every 6 months if you are not a heavy borrower. If you borrow money a lot, then monitoring your status monthly is recommended.
The fastest way to check your CRB status is by using Transunion nipashe service. This is because the process is easy and can be done using SMS only.
To complete this process successfully, make sure you have at least ksh 50 in your mpesa and you’ve loaded Ksh 100 airtime.
Follow these steps to check your CRB status on your phone using nipashe by Transunion.
Note: Each sms cost KES 19 to send. A less expensive way of checking your CRB status is by using the Transunion nipashe app.
To check your CRB status, you need to register with Transunion credit bureau. Here are the steps on how to register on Transunion CRB.
If you prefer to use another bureau to check your status, then you can see how to register on other CRBs.
Another option to check your CRB status is through Metropol credit bureau. Here is how to check your status on Metropol
Before you check your CRB status, you need to register with Metropol credit bureau. Here are the steps on how to register on Metropol CRB.
If you want to check your CRB status, it depends on which CRB provider you are going to use.
The quickest way by far is by using Transunion Kenya. Although it’s fast and easy, the process can be a bit more expensive compared to other CRB’s. They charge Ksh 19 for every SMS sent to query your status. This is on top of the Ksh 50 registration fee paid.
A clearance certificate is a certificate that is issued by a CRB to verify that you have not been negatively listed on CRB. This means that you have honoured all your loan obligations to lenders and are consistently paying your debts without missing out.
You can only get a clearance certificate if you have not been blacklisted / negatively listed on CRB.
A credit score is offered by CRB to help a business or employer assess credit risk of a customer and the probability of defaulting.
If you find yourself blacklisted on CRB i.e. negatively listed, then here are the steps you need to take. First, you need to inquire from the credit reference bureau which company has listed you. Second, contact the company that listed you, whether tala or Barclays bank, and find out what amount of money you need to pay to get your name out of their bad books. Next, make a payment to offset this amount.
Once you have followed this process of clearing your name from CRB, the company which had blacklisted you will send an updated batch number to the credit reference bureaus after 3 working days.
The Kenyan market has three major credit reference bureaus. This bureaus are creditinfo CRB, metropol CRB and TransUnion CRB. These three bureaus are licensed to operate and regulated by the CBK (central bank of Kenya).
All this bureaus are overseen by one body, the credit information sharing association of Kenya (CIS)
Having an issue with your status or credit score? Then you can get in-touch with your CRB. To get in touch with CRB use the following contacts to call them use telephone 020 7603752 for transunion, 020 2689881 for metropol and 020 3740272 for creditinfo. For more options to reach the credit reference bureau, check out this list of CRB contacts that includes emails and physical location.
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Credit information Sharing association of Kenya (CIS Kenya) is an oversight body setup to institutionalize the National credit Information sharing forum.
It was founded in early 2012 and it aims to promote best practices when it comes to credit provision in Kenya.
Not only that, CIS plays a big role in helping the growth of the Kenya credit market by implementing an effective credit information sharing system. They achieve this by establishing a self-regulatory mechanism centered on credit information sharing. This in turn brings about benefits for credit providers, consumers and the economy.
CRB is short for credit reference bureau which is a company that collects data on loans issued by lending institutions and creates credit reports on borrowers current and past loans.
Using this information, CRB in Kenya are able to create a credit profile showing repayment patterns of each borrower.
Institutions which give out loans like banks and mobile lending platforms get this report and use it to see whether they will issue you with a loan.
In Kenya, it is provided for in the law that each borrower is entitled to access a free copy of their report once a year. Follow these steps to get your credit report from metropol CRB, or these steps to get it from TransUnion CRB.
To get another report in the same calendar year, a user will have to pay for one from a register CRB operator.
How much does it cost to get a CRB credit report? To get a copy of your credit report, you will need to contact or pay a visit to one of the registered CRBs in Kenya. This can be done either physically, online via website or by sending an SMS.
And to get a copy of your status, you must register on their platforms on mobile or online to access the report.
Here is a breakdown of costs of getting credit report from different CRB’s in Kenya
| CRB | Registration Fee cost | Credit Report cost | Clearance Certificate cost |
| TransUnion | 50 | 1st one Free, 50 Ksh after that. | Ksh 2,200/= |
| Creditinfo | 50 | 1st one Free, 50 Ksh after that. | Ksh 2,200/= |
| Metropol | 50 | 1st one Free, 50 Ksh after that. | Ksh 2,200/= |
If you check information on your credit report and it’s not correct, you have a legal right to dispute the information. Here is how you approach a dispute with your CRB report.
To dispute a wrongful listing on CRB, follow these steps.
Also, if you as a borrower are not satisfied with the outcome, you are allowed to append a summary of the dispute which remains appended on the credit report.
Need to escalate the wrongful CRB listing further, then the CIS offers an independent Alternative Dispute Resolution Center. This service is known as Tatua Center. It deals exclusively with CRB in Kenya related disputes. Consumers can access the Tatua Center services free of charge.
If you are having a problem with your CRB status, then this is an alternative dispute resolution for CRB related issues in Kenya. Tatua center exclusively deals with CRB-related disputes and the service is free of charge.
This service helps particularly in cases were wrongful information is presented on CRB and leads to a situation where a customer seeking a loan gets a decision that goes against them leading to denial of the loan.
Tatua was established because the CIS mechanism is quite new in Kenya. This poses a challenge because many borrowers do not fully understand the CRB regulations in Kenya and the processes that are provided for in the law for dispute resolution.
Hence Tatua center aims to rightfully educate customers on the role CRB’s play through CIS. In addition to this, Tatua also aims to minimize the threat of court action. And by doing this, it reduces the cost of resolving CRB disputes by unsatisfied customers.
Tatua Center was established in November 2004 and has dealt with thousands of disputes. Even some disputes which had already been filed in court.
Here is a recommended step by step process of how to initiate a dispute with CRB in Kenya. This is the dispute process under CRB regulations 2013
Note: A CRB may charge you the cost of its service in conducting an investigation. This happens if the information you disputed turns out to be false.
See more frequently asked questions about the Tatua center here. You can also find the resources such as mediation intake form, mediation feedback form and ADR legal framework in the resources section of tatua.
So what are the functions of tatua to consumers, credit lenders and CBK can be found below.
Here is how you can reach customer care at Tatua center
There are three major Credit Bureaus in Kenya, creditinfo, transUnion and metropol. Here is a breakdown of this three companies that offer credit services in Kenya.
Creditinfo Kenya is a credit bureau owned by Creditinfo international. It operates in different parts of the world in Europe, Central Asia, Middle East, Caribbean and sub-saharan Africa. Not only do they offer credit bureau services, but also credit software, credit scoring and credit decisions.
In Kenya, they offer information related to credit with their services covering each stage of the customer life cycle.
This service is used by banks and other credit providers such as mobile loan apps, mobile lenders; to evaluate prospective customers, monitor performance of existing ones and manage the debts that they have incurred.
The data collect by Creditinfo CRB is from many sources. These services are provided in accordance with the relevant legal framework provided by the CBK (Central Bank of Kenya)
To check your CRB status, you will need to fill in the credit report request which you can find here. To check your status through Creditinfo CRB you can only use your email address or fill in the form online.
For dispute resolution on creditinfo, if you receive you CRB results and find that it is not accurate; you can start a formal dispute process. This is done by filling in a file dispute that you can find by clicking here.
Here are the consumer solutions that are offered by creditinfo credit reference bureau.
What is a credit report? This is information issued by credit reference bureau containing all or part of data your credit history.
Creditinfo CRB offers you a free credit report once every 12 months. Requesting it again within the same 12 month period, you will be charged.
Want to stay in the know about your CRB status? Then Creditinfo Monitoring is the service for you.
This is a service offered by the bureau and it’s called Creditinfo Monitoring. It allows you to keep up to date with changes to your credit history.
How does this work? It monitors any changes that occur to your credit report and sends an alert to your email address. This are changes that are reported to creditinfo CRB by financial institutions i.e. banks, loan apps etc.
What type of alerts do you get with this service?
A clearance certificate is a certificate that is issued by creditinfo to verify that you have not been negatively listed on CRB. This means that you have honoured all your loan obligations to lenders and are consistently paying your debts without missing out.
Creditinfo issues clearance certificate upon request. Clearance certificates are normally requested by:
Note: If you do not have a negative listing on your credit report, you will get a clearance certificate. However if you have a negative listing on your credit report, you will be issued a credit status certificate.
A credit score is offered by creditinfo to help businesses assess credit risk of a customer and the probability of defaulting. It is expressed in form of number ranges from 250 to 900.
Metropol is an information and credit management company and is one of the three CRB’s in Kenya. It was established in 1996 and is licensed by CBK to provide credit reference bureau (CRB) services to ALL banks in and financial lenders in Kenya.
The bureau services offered by metropol get credit information from different data sources. These sources include MFIs, SACCOs, HELB, Utilities, mobile phone companies and providers of goods and services on credit.
Metropol does this in order to help customers improve access to finance. Besides that, this information helps credit providers increase capacity to lend profitably to more customers.
The bureau supports credit providers in managing credit risk faced when they lend loan facilities to users. By doing this, they increase efficiency and lower risk of defaults. As a result, credit providers can maximize their profits.
Need to check if you are listed on CRB, this is how you go about it on metropol. Check whether you have been blacklisted on CRB i.e. negatively listed by either dialing metropol code *433# or by downloading the Metropol Crystopol app.
Want to know who has blacklisted you on CRB, then follow the procedure below.
We need a clearance certificate dor different reasons for example to apply for a loan or to provide to a potential; employer. Below find the steps to get CRB clearance certificate from metropol.
Need to get your credit report from CRB using metropol, follow these steps.
To access you CRB status through the metropol you will need to register on crystobol. You can do so by following these steps
Next, download your free credit report from metropol by clicking here.
Additional services metropol offers to customers are tools that help them negotiate favorable terms when applying and managing credit. This tools include
This is a detailed account of a customer’s borrowing with all current credit providers and their performance. It lists all the credit accounts, in the past and present, and shows the repayment history of each account.
Credit report is used by lenders, such as banks or mobile loan apps, to see whether they will offer you loan facilities.
So it’s very important to be checking your credit report at least every 6 months if you do not borrow often. And at least every month if you borrow often.
These are records of points that show how a consumer ranks in credit worthiness. There are different types of scores that metropol keeps. These are PPI (payment Performance index), Metro score (also known as consumer credit score) and q-score.
Payment Performance Index: This is a measure of how promptly customers (a borrower) meet their scheduled contractual financial obligations. (pay back credit i.e. loans and utilities.) It looks at a customer’s payment habits. This score helps credit provides anticipate customer’s future behavior. The index of measurement ranges from M1 to M9.
Consumer Cedit Score: This is a measure of a customer’s credit worthiness. It shows how likely a consumer is to pay credit lent to them e.g. loans and meet their financial obligations. The score ranges from 200 to 900. Having a score of less than 400 indicates that customer is in default.
Q-score: This is referred to as data quality and quantity score.
It is becoming common place for government and private sector to ask prospective employees to present a certificate of clearance from a licensed CRB. Certificate of clearance is used to know your Employee (KYE), Know your Customer (KYC), Know your Agent (KYA) or to clear a business person applying for a tender or doing business with SMEs or corporate clients.
Transunion is one of the three main players in the Kenya CRB space. Their mission is to help people gain access to opportunities that can improve their quality of life. It is also the largest credit Bureau in South Africa.
They offer information on credit i.e. loans and debt to both businesses and consumers. For consumers, TransUnion provides information resources and tools on credit history and financial reputation. This information is offered in partnership with banks, healthcare providers, property managers and other companies.
TransUnion operates in 8 countries in Africa. These are Kenya, Botswana, Namibia, Rwanda, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Malawi.
The CRB service offered by metropol is called nipashe service. This service can be accessed either by SMS or by using their nipashe app found on google playstore. The SMS service costs 19 KSH for each message you send.
Need to check your CRB status online? The Transunion CRB offers this service to customers.
You can access your CRB status through the following methods:
Here is how you can contact Transunion CRB for customer support
Now that you have learnt about CRB in Kenya, here is a brief summary. CRB’s play a very big role in the credit market in Kenya i.e. how you borrow loans. Currently, there are three major bureaus that offer this service; Metro credit, credit info and TransUnion.
Credit reference bureaus offer four main services; credit status, credit report, clearance certificate and credit score. Each user can access one report for free annually, after that they will have to pay a fee to get the report.
Clearance certificates are important because they can be used by banks to gauge whether or not they will give you a loan, by employers to see how credit worthy a possible (hire) employee is before hiring, when applying for business and tenders with the government or corporations.
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