AI is becoming a part of the lending decision process in some places in Kentucky

Artificial Intelligence is finding it’s way into both the public and private sectors. That includes the financial institution arena.

Commonwealth Credit Union in Kentucky has been using AI to evaluate borrowers for three years now. CEO Karen Harbin said artificial intelligence allows for deeper lending and to more protected classes. She said it can examine around 200 data points quickly.

“And then they come back with a decision in 2.4 seconds. If we were manually underwriting that it would take five to seven minutes and we would only be looking at 15-20 data points,” said Harbin.

Harbin said Commonwealth Credit Union AI due diligence included talking to references and dark scoring which is running parallel for the first few months. Harbin served on a panel as part of a field congressional hearing last week in Lexington.

Mike De Vere is CEO of Zest A-I, a California tech company. He also testified during the Lexington hearing. De Vere noted it’s about displacing old credit tools with A-I. He added it’s able to consume more data and come up with a more accurate assessment of risks. De Vere said there are protections in place.

“You’re not turning over your underwriting decision to an AI bot or what have you. It’s just a tool for very talented people like the chief lending officer at Commonwealth that she can use to decide who can get the loan or not,” said De Vere.

De Vere was referring to Commonwealth Credit Union CEO Karen Harbin. De Vere said about one out of five credit unions nationally are using this type of technology.

** WEKU is working hard to be a leading source for public service, and fact-based journalism. Monthly supporters are the top funding source for this growing nonprofit news organization. Please join others in your community who support WEKU by making your donation.