The phone asks for one thing on a loan application before a person’s income proof, and that is permission. A grey box shows up, with the accounts loaded in a list, and a button that says ‘Allow’. Most people agree to it in under three seconds. What they don’t know, sitting behind that button, is the permission to access all your payment data, from the salary you receive, the rent you pay, to the details of a failed autopay from March.
Earlier, lenders used to judge a person based on the bureau score they had, which today is normally referred to as a CIBIL score. Now the movement of money coming in and leaving your bank account is what decides if you are eligible for a loan.
This guide explains what payment data the lenders have, what it reveals, and how much personal control someone can have over it.
What Does A Lender See After Someone Taps Allow?
Under a framework by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) commonly known as ‘Account Aggregator’, a licensed intermediary provides lenders with limited financial data from a borrower’s bank. The access is mostly restricted to a limited time period and requires clear consent from the applicant.
This allows the lender to see:
- The patterns of the applicant’s account balances and income stability. This helps them understand whether money stays or often runs out before payday.
- They see the purchases the applicant has made to make an analysis of their spending habits. The review is completely financial, not personal.
Sahamati, the RBI-recognised body that looks after this approval process, reported more than 45 crore cumulative consents granted and over 7 lakh consents raised each day in FY 2026. Every one of those was a person tapping the button you just tapped.
The lenders understand that bank statements do not explain reasons for a low account balance every month. As somebody whose salary gets credited on the second of every month, they can look steadier financially than someone who gets a bigger amount credited but not at the same time every month.
Why A Bureau Score Alone No Longer Decides Loans
The bureau score of a person is built based on their past credit history. For someone who has never borrowed at all, their score remains low, which is why a first-time applicant with a steady salary gets judged worse than someone paying three loans without any missed payment.
Nowadays, lenders consider factors other than just the bureau score, and a common one of them is a person’s regular spending. Expenses like app payments, utility bills, rent, and phone recharges often do not count as borrowings, but they all show if a person is reliable with money or not.
This change is possible because of how many people use digital payments now. The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) announced that UPI payments were at 23.66 billion transactions in July 2026 alone, making it the highest record for a single month.
Can Payment Data Work Against The Applicant?
Yes, the payment data can work very quietly against the applicant.
Certain thin trails can show a person as riskier to offer a loan. Someone who is a cash-heavy earner, a gig worker paid in lump sum, or anyone whose balance stays at zero for more than twenty days at a stretch can look like a risky applicant on paper even though they are quite good with their finances.
Another way the payment data can backfire is by showing the applicant’s bounced auto-debit for a subscription. When a subscription payment fails, the automated system can mistake it for a missed loan payment, even though they are not the same thing.
Sharing information like this can help people a lot when applying for loans, but it cannot guarantee a loan approval. If two families earn the same amount of money every month, the one that spends money unevenly would get a very different offer than the other one.
Payment data also rewards good habits over intention. If someone pays a bill early every time, this might not show up on their credit score, but it makes a person look very responsible when a bank checks these records.
Who Controls The Consent, And How Do You Pull It Back?
The consent for the payment data is very time-bound and has a revocable nature. The applicant has the choice of whether they want to approve the purpose, the duration, or just cancel the request from the app itself.
Not many people check these settings. The Digital Personal Data Protection Rules have just notified that registered consent managers will be put in charge to watch over applicants’ data, starting from November 2026. They will act like a guard between both parties to make sure everything is handled correctly.
So, before applying for any loans, look at the duration first to check whether it’s asking for a single one-time consent for a short duration, or it’s running over twelve months. If there is a choice given, always go for the shorter one.
By sharing this data, the applicant is showing the bank their financial story. Banks need to know what is in that story before they say yes.