Checking your CIBIL score online is one of the most important steps in understanding your personal creditworthiness. However, when accessing your CIBIL score online, you’ll notice that a PAN (Permanent Account Number) card is almost always required. This necessity is not just for formalities—it serves a crucial purpose. Here’s a comprehensive look at why a PAN card is integral to online CIBIL score checks and how it ensures accuracy, security, and efficiency in credit assessment.
Unique Identification Across Financial Records
The PAN card serves as a unique and universal identifier for individuals within India’s financial ecosystem. Whenever you apply for a credit card, loan, or other financial product, your PAN is tagged to the account. This means that all credit-related data—such as repayment history, outstanding loans, and credit card dues—are linked to a single number that does not change over time.
When you attempt to conduct CIBIL score check online by PAN card, the credit bureau retrieves your financial records from various banks and financial institutions. This is because these records are tied to your PAN. Thus, providing your PAN ensures that the bureau pulls the correct data set. Without a PAN, there would be no consistent marker to aggregate information from multiple sources, making it impossible to generate a precise and reliable credit score.
Standardisation Across Lenders and Institutions
Financial institutions across India use the PAN card as a standard document to report credit-related information. Whether it’s a home loan, personal loan, car loan, or credit card, all these accounts are linked to your PAN. This uniformity makes the PAN indispensable when accessing your credit profile.
TransUnion CIBIL and other credit bureaus rely on this standardisation to maintain consistent credit records. When you provide your PAN, the bureau can easily match your data across different institutions, ensuring that your credit report reflects all your financial activities. Without a standardised identifier like the PAN, the system would be prone to errors, duplication, or omission of important credit information.
Ensuring Accuracy in Credit Reports
Accurate credit reports are vital for assessing creditworthiness. Your CIBIL score depends heavily on the completeness and correctness of your credit history. Since the PAN card is a permanent and unique number, it minimises the risk of errors that could occur if other forms of identification were used.
For instance, addresses can change, and names may be spelled differently on various documents. The PAN, however, remains constant, serving as an unchanging anchor for your financial records. This consistency allows credit bureaus to compile accurate reports. When you check your CIBIL score online using your PAN, you’re more likely to see an accurate reflection of your financial activities, helping you make well-informed credit decisions.
Simplifying the Verification Process
Online credit checks require secure and efficient verification processes. Because a CIBIL score is a sensitive piece of financial information, ensuring that the person requesting the score is indeed the rightful owner of the credit profile is critical.
The PAN card simplifies this verification. It’s a widely recognised and easily verifiable ID that financial institutions and credit bureaus trust. By entering your PAN, you instantly provide the credit bureau with a reliable method of confirming your identity, speeding up the verification process. This eliminates the need for more cumbersome identification procedures and ensures that you can access your score quickly and securely.
Government Mandates and Compliance
The importance of the PAN card extends beyond its practical utility; it is also reinforced by government mandates and compliance standards. In India, the PAN card is a primary identification document for financial transactions. It is required for filing income tax returns, conducting large financial transactions, and opening various types of accounts.
Given its regulatory importance, credit bureaus naturally rely on PAN details to streamline their processes. Using a document that is already mandated for financial activity makes it easier for credit bureaus to maintain compliance, reduce errors, and ensure that credit reports meet industry standards. The use of PAN aligns with regulatory requirements, creating a more seamless system for both borrowers and lenders.
Convenience and Familiarity
The PAN card is not only essential but also convenient. Most individuals already possess a PAN card, making it readily available for use. Unlike certain documents that may be hard to find or require additional steps to obtain, a PAN card is typically accessible.
When checking your CIBIL score online, having a familiar and easily retrievable document like a PAN card ensures that you can complete the process quickly. This convenience helps make online credit checks more user-friendly and encourages more people to monitor their credit health regularly.
Disclaimer: No Business Standard Journalist was involved in creation of this content