Key metrics:

• Save 1 week’s worth of manual merchant monitoring processes
• Prevented hundreds of thousands of dollars in downstream fraud losses through proactive closure of 50+ suspicious merchants

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Context

Since 2012, Foundation Finance has been helping individuals bring their home improvement projects to life by offering consumer financing through dealers and retail networks. Dealers are a critical intermediary in between Foundation Finance and end consumers, so it’s important that Foundation Finance works with reputable partners. If a dealer’s business worsens or engages in suspicious activity, the platform needs to be aware of it and act on it immediately.

Historically, the company manually onboarded and monitored dealers on its platform. While the team set up some basic reports to identify suspicious dealers, they lacked the ability to monitor the portfolio all at once, and often picked up on lagging indicators of riskiness, putting them in a reactive position instead of proactive. The team tried out other risk management tools but wasn’t getting the results and efficiency gains it was looking for.

As financial regulatory scrutiny increased across the industry, the Foundation Finance team asked themselves: are we doing enough to manage dealer risk, and are we doing it efficiently?

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Solution: Automated adverse media & review insights to reduce reputational risks

After speaking with Coris’s team, Andrea McCullion, Chief Business Development Officer at Foundation Finance, knew the Risk platform and monitoring capabilities were right up their alley. After a quick integration, the team immediately began seeing results.

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Adverse Media Insights

Since Foundation Finance relies on dealers to facilitate financing for end borrowers, they need to maintain a strong understanding of the legitimacy and business health of dealers at all times. Any issues with dealers can negatively impact Foundation Finance’s reputation (and bottom line).

Before using Coris, Foundation Finance did not have a scalable process for monitoring dealers. Now, Adverse Media Insights automatically searches across media outlets to find negative information regarding a business or its beneficial owners. This information can include accusations of business fraud (credit card fraud, forgery, etc.), convictions, or open cases against the business or its management.

By using Adverse Media Insights, the team identified suspicious actors in their dealer base and were able to mitigate these third party risks. 

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3rd party platform data from Google & Yelp

Data from Google reviews also keeps Foundation Finance’s team one step ahead of warning signs within their dealer base. For example, Google closure notifications help the team identify dealers who may no longer be active and can be removed from the platform to avoid accidental transactions.

In addition, sentiment changes in platform reviews can serve as a leading indicator of a dealer in trouble. Foundation Finance tracks custom keywords across these platforms – fraud, attorney general, scam, etc. If the team notices an uptick in keyword references, it can forward the alert to manual review and dive deeper.

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Strong customer support 

Foundation Finance’s team wanted to partner with a company that was receptive to its unique customer base and needs. The Coris team’s risk expertise, openness to feedback, and high product velocity mean that Foundation Finance can continue leveraging Coris as it scales.

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The result: Time savings, and dozens of suspicious merchants terminated

With Coris’s risk platform, Foundation Finance routinely saves 1 week’s worth of manual merchant monitoring responsibilities, and can leverage 1 tool to do the work of multiple risk analysts. 

In addition, the team has used features such as Adverse Media Insights to proactively surface suspicious dealers and terminate their accounts. This has helped the team avoid hundreds of thousands of dollars in downstream fraud losses.

The Foundation Finance team is excited to expand on these gains soon by leveraging Coris for another manual process: dealer onboarding.

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Want to learn more?

Interested in leveraging Coris to automate your merchant risk monitoring strategies? Get in touch.