Frequently Asked Questions

First Access is a software platform for digital transformation of credit and other financial services. We help lenders configure their unique credit underwriting, analysis, approval, and management processes. The platform is designed for extreme flexibility of data sources, enabling lenders to incorporate nearly any source of customer data via API or to collect it manually offline, which is especially relevant in emerging markets. The First Access platform helps traditional lenders go digital and digital lenders grow more data-driven. Because of its flexibility, the platform can be used to accommodate a wide range of origination needs and nearly any combination of automation and human judgment for each step of a customer acquisition process. It is used by commercial banks, digital lenders, asset financing companies, e-commerce companies, P2P lending platforms, microfinance institutions, financial cooperatives, and more.

It’s simple to get started. Click "Sign Up" at the top right of your screen. We can talk through your needs and create a proposal and pilot together to help you address them.

Every action yields data. To be data-driven is to collect that data, examine important patterns, and use it to inform better decisions about the future. Data-driven companies recognize the potential for constant improvement. They use their data to guide how they change over time.

The First Access platform is designed to be affordable, easy to implement, and flexible. There are many changes you can already make yourself, including managing Users, Roles, and Branch locations. Changes to your digital credit policy (like which types of data to collect on customers, whether data should be required or optional, or adjusting your automated analysis and scoring) are made with the help of the First Access team, usually within a day or two depending on the complexity of your request. These requests can be made directly on the platform by clicking on the blue support button in the bottom right corner of your web application. We are already working hard on the design and development of updates to the platform that will allow you to do even more of the configuration changes yourself.

There are two primary ways to use the First Access platform: 1. Customers apply for loans in person from traditional lenders whose staff or agents use the First Access mobile app to collect information at the point of sale. This is often the first step in the digital journey for traditional lenders who are migrating from paper. The First Access platform is available in web browsers and Android smartphones and tablets, enabling your staff to collect the right data on customers anywhere, even offline. 2. Customers apply online via web using First Access, or for via their lender's mobile banking app, which can then push the customer data via API to manage their credit decisions on the First Access platform. Lenders also integrate data from other sources into their First Access accounts, incorporating a wider digital footprint, alternative data sources, and other external information into their credit decisions.

No, the First Access platform allows you to choose the balance of human judgment and automation that's right for your customers and business. You can choose whether you want manual or automatic actions for data collection, data processing, and credit decisions. For example, if your initial touchpoint with customers happens through a loan officer or sales agent, they could collect customer information at the point of sale using our mobile app. If you reach customers through digital marketing or offer credit related to an existing e-commerce or payments platform, for example, you can push customer information to First Access via API. Whether your data is automatically or manually captured, you may also choose whether to have humans review and approve it, and whether to have humans make the actual credit decisions. To automate these processes, you can provide your logic to First Access and we will help you embed it into your custom account. Please contact us to learn more.

Software as a Service (SaaS) is the model of subscribing to software and accessing it through the internet. The advantages of SaaS are plentiful. First, the setup costs are usually much lower than building software in-house or having a third party develop custom software for your company. Second, the software never goes out of date. SaaS platforms are constantly being updated with new features, and you are never stuck with last year’s model. Finally, SaaS is built to scale. Need to add more users or increase usage? No problem. SaaS platforms make it easy to increase capacity and facilitate fast growth without adding new hardware, for example.

The First Access platform is available all over the world. Please contact us to see how the platform can help your company make stronger, faster credit decisions for nearly any kind of loan product.

Yes! The appraisal forms on the First Access platform, which comprise the bulk of the mobile app, can be translated into a wide variety of languages. It is not yet available in languages written right-to-left, including Arabic, Hebrew, Kurdish and Urdu. Please contact us to learn more.

Yes! First Access offers on-premise hosting and, based on availability, hosting in local data centers. Please contact us for more information.

Yes! Our API is accessible to all companies using the First Access platform. Please contact us for more information.

Yes! First Access offers an application programming interface (API) that allows for integrations with third-party services. This can include credit reference bureaus, national ID systems, core banking or loan management software, SMS notification platforms, and more. You can also download your data from the platform anytime. Please contact us to learn more.

Yes! Please contact us for more information about the product, service, or source of data you're interested in integrating with First Access.

Yes! First Access offers an open application programming interface (API) that allows for integrations with third-party services that also have open APIs. This can include credit reference bureaus, national ID systems, core banking or loan management software, SMS notification platforms, and more. Please contact us to learn more.

First Access can be integrated with third-party apps that retrieve data from other sources, including Android activity logs. Data from other services can be pushed or pulled to First Access and you can configure exactly how you want that data validated and analyzed, as well as what actions you want to take based on it, including automatic approval or rejection of loans. There are many third-party solutions for scraping Android, app, and Internet usage data.

Many credit bureaus do have APIs accessible by local financial institution clients. You can often learn this by searching on their websites.

Yes! If the credit bureau you'd like to retrieve data from has an API, you can most likely retrieve the data via First Access as well.

You can push virtually any kind of data to First Access or pull it from First Access. Data may be manually captured in the field by loan officers or sales agents using the First Access app, or may be pushed from other sources, such as your mobile banking app or your website.

First Access takes data privacy and security very seriously. You can find the link to our policy in the footer of this page or go directly to http://www.firstaccess.co/privacy. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us.

Yes! First Access offers an Application Programming Interface (API) that allows for integrations with third-party data and services, as well as the ability to customize all data used in a loan decision if you would like to incorporate your internal or other unique dataset. Please contact us to learn more.

Yes! You can push it via our API and configure how you would like it analyzed. If you are offering credit to customers who already use an existing product or service, such as a mobile money platform, you may want to consider both on-demand loan origination or bulk origination to push pre-approvals to customers. Financial institutions use the First Access for on-demand origination from new and repeat customers, as well as bulk pre-approvals for repeat customers whose loans are nearing maturity.

No, the First Access platform is designed to enable digitization and to "operationalize" a wide range of mathematical analysis and models once built. While we got our start building algorithms ourselves, we've found as we've grown that most companies that are ready for scoring and automation are already digital and have a strong preference for designing their own proprietary analytics, which we can then run on First Access as needed. Most companies that are not yet ready to automate decisions based on a calculated credit score need to first focus on digitizing their data collection. Good data can then be used for analysis to identify which patterns among customers and staff can be used to automate decisions and spur faster growth. Over time, the data yielded through digital operations enables credit decisions to become increasingly sophisticated.

The First Access platform is flexible and can be configured to accommodate a wide range of mathematical models and types of calculations. Please contact us to learn more.

Configurations can be updated easily. Depending on the component, First Access can update it for you upon request or you can update it yourself. We are working hard to create tools for administrators of accounts on our platform to be able to make all updates directly. However, user-friendliness is also extremely important to us, so we are constantly testing our own tools to develop even easier ones, then putting them directly in the hands of the companies on our platform.

Yes! Most types of scoring and credit analysis models can be configured right in your First Access account. You can also host your models elsewhere and push their results to First Access, push scores or analysis from other sources to First Access, and run models or analysis on any kind of data that gets pushed, such as matrices of scores from different sources.

Yes! You can configure analysis to recommend specific loan terms, like loan size, interest rate, tenor, or to choose from a range of products. You provide the logic and we will help you configure it on the First Access platform.

There are three ways to use First Access: web, mobile, and API. Web users may use Internet-enabled laptops or tablets and login in a browser like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer or Safari. It works best on recent versions. For Android tablets, we recommend using the native Android app, but you may also use the web app on iOS tablets. Mobile users should use the native Android app to interact with the First Access platform. The app works for Android 5.0 and up. Download the app by following the link at the bottom of our website, or searching for "First Access" on Google Play.

This decision is up to each company. Many of the companies using our platform first have staff test it using personal devices, then invest in company-owned devices at a later time.

No, First Access is a software platform that can be accessed from a wide range of devices.

First Access provides in-app support in its web application, with response times that range from immediate to within a few hours. We provide close support during the early stages of companies configuring and testing our platform to ensure that it is set up to best meet their needs.

Please check out our support section at https://support.firstaccess.io, contact us directly through your company admin, or use the blue button in the bottom corner of your web app to send us a message in real-time.