Our mission has no finish line. We exist to simplify and democratise SME financing, an evermoving target for us with constant room for improvement. And the way we do that is by listening to our customers, accepting feedback, and continuously improving the customer experience.

We recently ran a campaign to speak to all our borrowers individually and collect their feedback on their experience with Fundkiss – right from their initial engagement with us to their projects being launched and disbursement.

With 100 participants included in this borrower survey, we feel that the responses provide deep insights improve our overall customer experience.

First up, we asked our borrowers how they first came to know of Fundkiss.

• Social Media – 43% of the surveyed borrowers first came across Fundkiss on Social Media, nearly all of them (97.62%) cited Facebook, followed by LinkedIn.
• Referrals – 23% of the surveyed borrowers heard about it from their peers.
• Online Display ads – 11% of the surveyed borrowers first learnt of Fundkiss through our google online display ads across the internet.
• Radio – The good old radio was where 8% of our surveyed borrowers first hear of Fundkiss.

57% of the surveyed borrowers explored traditional financing options before choosing Fundkiss, these options include banks, finance, insurance and leasing companies. Fundkiss was the first choice for the 43% of the surveyed borrowers.

It was very encouraging for us to know that for 43% of our customers, we were the first choice when it came to financing their business. What we also learnt here is that given our innovative product, we would have to keep working harder on educating our consumer base of alternative financing options available to them and increasing awareness about Fundkiss to ultimately become the go to financing option for SMEs in Mauritius.

We wanted to know what made them trust Fundkiss for their financing needs. Here is what we found:

1. Unsecured Business Loans – Business loans through Fundkiss do not require any collateral or personal guarantee from our borrowers. 68% of the surveyed borrowers cited this as the main reason they chose us.

2. Speed and Convenience of the Application – There are no long queues here. You could apply for a loan with us from the comfort of your home using a smartphone. Once your application is received by us, we do not waste any time to make sure your application is processed as fast as possible.

47% of the survey respondents cited these two reasons behind choosing Fundkiss.

3. Speed of Funding – We have worked hard to reduce our average campaign duration to 5 days and average disbursement time to 3 working days. Speed of funding remains one of the most important KPIs for us and we will continue working hard to improve it. We understand how important it is for our borrowers and their businesses to have rapid access to financing.

46% of surveyed borrowers chose Fundkiss because of our ability to fund their projects fast.

We asked our borrowers, what makes your borrowing experience a positive one? We learnt some insightful things from them.

In order of importance, this is what mattered more to SME owners when borrowing:

1. Help from the customer support team;
2. The range of unsecured loans available on our platform;
3. The speed of the application process;
4. The transparency of the application process;
5. Ease of application, and
6. Interest rates on offer.

Contrary to popular belief, interest rates mattered the least. What really matters to a business owner is the convenience and speed of application, speed of approval and funding, and what mattered the most was the good ‘ol customer service and empathy.

When we asked our borrowers about their paint points throughout the loan application process, sourcing bank statements, financial statements and MRA returns were described as the major pain points.

It is difficult for customers to provide manual bank statements, it requires business owners to take time away from their work and physically visit a branch. The same goes for financial statements, where they rely heavily on their accountants, and MRA returns.

There is a solution to this, open banking.

Open banking is the safe and controlled sharing of data between organisations through digital APIs. Imagine instead of queuing up for bank statements at a bank or at MRA for tax documentation, Fundkiss could simply request the information digitally, straight from the organisation through APIs, with valid authorisation from the client.

Open banking is increasingly becoming the norm globally. It may seem like a distant idea for the Mauritian ecosystem but the digital possibilities and benefit to users from open banking is tremendous.

We received great insights from clients on how we can improve. As our journey continues, we have made the process of listening to our customers through our surveys a standard procedure at Fundkiss.

The way forward is very clear for us. We will continue making the experience of financing faster and simpler for SMEs in Mauritius. On the back of the feedback received, we will continue to improve the application, credit assessment and after-sales processes to bring a digital solution that offers the best possible credit experience to our borrowers.