This article provides information on overseas income and compliance requirements. Remember, many lenders have withdrawn from lending to non-residents so we recommend checking with the lender before proceeding.
Verification Requirements
Under Responsible Lending, the requirements for reasonable enquiries and verification will vary depending on the circumstances of the individual customer. Where a customer’s capacity to understand the credit contract is limited, you will be required to undertake additional enquiries to ensure the contract is not unsuitable.
The below supporting information must be available in Mercury.
Verification of income
2 consecutively dated payslips, with a translation into English.
A letter from the employer with an interpretation into English. The letter must be on the employer’s letterhead.
A copy of the customer’s employment contract if applicable, interpreted into English.
Group certificate or equivalent, if applicable.
3 months of bank statements (not internet transaction listing) verifying income being deposited.
Documents must be translated into English by a certified translator.
Mandatory Compliance Documents
The mandatory compliance documents (Credit Guide, Summary of Requirements and Credit Proposal, Preliminary Assessment and the Quote) will need to be provided in English. However, you can make detailed notes that you have explained the document to the customer in the language that they understand.
You may want to have the client sign a declaration that you have read and explained the document in full in the language that they understand and above all, clearly document that you have recommended that they obtain independent legal advice to ensure that they understand the contract. If the customer chooses not to obtain advice, at least you can ensure that you recommend that they receive this.
If you are emailing the customer in their language, you will need to provide a note of what information the email contains. Remember that your files can be reviewed at any stage and therefore we will need to be able to understand what was discussed. Mercury will not accept emails or notes in foreign characters so if you are using the Mercury email add-in, the language will appear as ‘???????’. You will need to make a PDF version of the email or document and save it as an attachment in Mercury.
All conversations you have with the customers in their chosen language will need to be documented in Mercury. I.e. a detailed note that you discussed the contents of documents provided to the customer and the customer has understood this. This note in Mercury will need to be in English. At the end of the day, so long as you are documenting what discussions you had with the customer (and the documentation of your conversations is written in English), you can explain the documents to your customers verbally in the language that they understand.
Please send any questions you have to [email protected]