Build your Borrowing Power
Your financial behaviour affects your Borrowing Power and eligibility. By increasing your Borrowing Power, your eligibility will improve.
Your financial behaviour affects your Borrowing Power and eligibility. By increasing your Borrowing Power, your eligibility will improve.
Improve your eligibility
Good financial habits such as making payments on time and not going beyond your credit limit can have a big impact.
Good financial habits such as making payments on time and not going beyond your credit limit can have a big impact.
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The higher your Borrowing Power, the more cards and loans you could be accepted for on TotallyMoney.
The higher your Borrowing Power, the more cards and loans you could be accepted for on TotallyMoney.
Start improving your eligibility now
See exactly what factors impact your Borrowing Power and eligibility, and what you can do to improve — only in the TotallyMoney app.
Discover more…
What is Borrowing Power?
Borrowing Power is a number out of 10 that tells you how likely you are to be eligible for credit.
The higher your Borrowing Power, the more cards and loans you could be accepted for on TotallyMoney.
What is eligibility?
Eligibility is how likely you are to be accepted for credit. If you have a good eligibility, it means the lender thinks you’re someone who can responsibly borrow and repay money.
How is Borrowing Power calculated?
Lots of data goes into creating your Borrowing Power. This includes information from your credit profile, live data about the credit market, and what we know lenders like to see in applications. This includes making sure you never miss a repayment, and are on the electoral register.
👆🏼 Click on the 'FAQs' tab above to learn more.
If you’re interested in borrowing money with a credit card or loan, you can visit your Offers page and view your Borrowing Power.
If your Borrowing Power is high, it means you should have a wider range of credit offers when you check your eligibility.
If you continue to look at the credit cards and loans available through TotallyMoney, you’ll see your eligibility as a percentage. You can then decide if you want to continue with an application, based on how likely you are to be accepted for the specific offer.
Your Borrowing Power can change regularly for lots of reasons, some of which are out of your control. For example:
Borrowing Power looks at the wider credit market. So, if there are less cards available, your Borrowing Power could decrease because lenders are accepting fewer credit applications.
Changes to your personal information, such as employment status, salary, or if you have recently moved address.
You recently checked your eligibility for credit. When you check your eligibility for cards and loans on TotallyMoney, we may recalculate your Borrowing Power based on the type of cards that are available to you.
If your Borrowing Power is low, here are some ways you could increase it. Increasing your Borrowing Power will also increase your eligibility for credit on TotallyMoney.
Make sure all your details are correct and up-to-date in your credit report. If you continue to improve your credit score, your Borrowing Power should also increase.
Get on the electoral register if you aren’t already. This helps lenders to confirm your identity when you apply for credit
Use credit building cards if you’re eligible. Used responsibly, these help to show you’re reliable when borrowing and repaying money.
Download the TotallyMoney app and see if there are any eligibility factors holding back your Borrowing Power. We'll tell you what you can do to tackle these factors.
Your Borrowing Power may drop for a few reasons. This doesn’t necessarily mean it's because of any changes in your credit profile or that you’re not eligible for cards or loans.
Reasons your borrowing power may have decreased:
Changes in the credit market, such as lenders removing cards or loans that you were previously eligible for, or limiting the number of customers they accept.
Changes to your personal information, such as employment status, salary, or if you have recently moved address.
Your credit score has decreased. There isn’t a direct link between your Borrowing Power and credit score, but it could mean that credit offers you were previously eligible for are no longer available to you, and your new Borrowing Power is a reflection of this.
You should always check your eligibility for the credit offers on our website before you apply, to make sure you know how likely you are to be accepted.
If we have been unable to provide you with a Borrowing Power score, this could be because you don’t currently have enough credit history to create a full credit report. Even if we have provided you with your TransUnion credit report, because your Borrowing Power uses Experian data, it could be that Experian don’t hold enough information on you.
Credit history is important as lenders will be able to make a more informed decision on you if they have more information available to them. A good history can also help as it can give you the broadest range of borrowing options when dealing with big life events.
However, if you’ve never taken out a loan, credit card, phone contract or car finance before, you might not have sufficient credit history. This isn’t anything to worry about, you can build up your history by taking out affordable forms of credit and show potential lenders that you can manage them responsibly. Some of your options include:
Take out a new contract with a mobile phone provider;
Open a current account;
Take out a credit card designed to help build your credit rating;
Register on the electoral roll
Another reason your report may not have been found is because Experian were unable to match the data you entered with the information they currently hold on you.
Please make sure you have entered all your details correctly so they can match you.
