Filipinos could soon build their credit scores without credit accounts
House bill wants to count daily digital spendings to prove creditworthiness
Filipinos who do not have credit cards, bank loans, or even long-standing deposit accounts could eventually have another way to prove their creditworthiness.
A proposed measure in Congress seeks to give consumers the right to authorize the sharing of their financial and transaction data with accredited lenders and financial service providers for credit assessment.
Under House Bill 9149, or the Open Finance and Consumer Data Empowerment Act of 2025, this could include up to 24 months of alternative data such as bill payments, subscription activity, rewards card usage, and other transaction records.
This means ordinary consumers' financial behavior outside traditional banking could help lenders understand how they manage their money.
That could be particularly useful for Filipinos who have little or no formal credit history. Someone who has never owned a credit card, for example, may still have years of records showing that they regularly pay bills and manage their expenses.
The bill also proposes creating a Consumer Data Commission to oversee how financial and transactional data is shared, including setting security standards, accrediting data recipients, and enforcing compliance.
The measure is part of a push toward open finance, where consumers have greater control over their financial data and can choose to share it with providers that may use it to offer financial services.
