We're excited to share the Credit History Lookup endpoint, an addition to our Mono Lookup API suite, giving businesses in Nigeria one more modern way to seamlessly assess credit applications. In a growing economy where consumer credit plays a major role, lenders and creditors need to meet a high demand for loans, and while doing so, look out for important lending risk factors. Mono serves many digital lending and financing businesses, and providing infrastructure that ensures that they can meet the needs of their borrowers while lending in a smart, low-risk, and data-driven way, is our top priority.
Features of the Credit History Lookup Endpoint
The credit history API relies on the BVN data point to give lenders access to credit history data from two of the largest credit bureaus in Nigeria.
Using the BVN which a potential borrower/customer has consented to share with you, your business can make calls to the Mono Credit History endpoint to retrieve:
Identity details such as the user's full name and contact details
All details of recent and historical (up to 5 years) credit facilities accessed, such as the name of the institutions they have borrowed from, the amount and tenor of each facility, and the opening and expected closing dates.
All statuses on credit facilities accessed, showing which loans are performing/open, closed, and non-performing.
The benefits of using the Mono Credit History Lookup endpoint
Improved borrower profiling - the Credit History API can supercharge your existing underwriting and borrower profiling process, allowing you to understand how a user borrows and repays, spot any patterns in lending behaviour and apply your existing loan decision framework more confidently
Faster loan processing - you're able to deliver lending decisions to your users/potential borrowers in minutes and prevent drop-offs.
Credit risk reduction - you can adjust loan offerings, and accept or even decline loan applications from the robust borrowing history you can access from the Credit History lookup API, to reduce the risk of lending to over-committed or bad borrowers.
Quick integration - the Credit History Lookup endpoint is developer-friendly, quick and easy to integrate. You can get started in just minutes.
Verified borrower history source - the Credit History Lookup API instantly retrieves accurate current and historical lending information, going back up to 5 years [on each borrower], directly from two of the largest credit bureaus in Nigeria. Here's a sample response showing robust information that is returned when you call the endpoint.
How to get started:
If you already have a Mono account,
Create an app and set the scope to Lookup
Grab the app's secret key
Make a call to the endpoint using your customer's BVN and indicating what institution you'd like to retrieve borrowing history from
Here's a guide in our API documentation to walk you through this integration, calling this endpoint, and a sample of the expected response you will receive.
If you're using Mono for the first time
Create a Mono account here
Submit all required business documents and request for activation
Create an app on your dashboard and set the product scope to 'Lookup'
Grab the app's secret key
Follow our API documentation to walk you through the steps.
Make a call to the endpoint using your customer's BVN and indicating what institution you'd like to retrieve borrowing history from
Questions you might have about the Mono Credit History Lookup endpoint and answers to them
Who can use the Mono Credit History lookup endpoint?
If you're a Nigerian business in the credit and financing industry (digital lenders, Buy Now Pay Later, Credit Unions, etc), looking to improve your underwriting process, power your lending with data-driven decisions, and reduce lending risk, you can use the Mono Credit History API.
How much does it cost to use the Mono Credit History lookup endpoint?
It costs ₦300 per API call to either of the institutions, and ₦600 per API call to retrieve information from both institutions in one call.
