A tycoon has sued managers of a mobile money lending company after he was listed with a Credit Reference Bureau over a Sh1,000 loan he never took.
Trouble for Mr Peter Nduati started when his company – Centric Air – was in the final stages of obtaining a loan when the bank told him he did not qualify as he had been listed with a CRB.
“I am very particular about maintaining a good credit score. The bank could not disclose who had blacklisted me and I was referred to the bureau,” he said.
BORROWED MONEY
That is when he realised that the mobile money lending app – which we cannot name for legal reasons – reported him in December 2018.
Mr Nduati, who narrated his tribulations on Twitter, said he had never borrowed money from any mobile app.
To make matters worse, he found out that the phone number in question did not belong to him.
According to Mr Nduati, the mobile network told him that the number was not registered in his name but declined to tell him who it belonged to. “I went back to the CRB with that report. I was told that only the money lender could clear me. I had to write a dispute letter,” he said.
The company insisted that the number was linked to his national identity card number and that he borrowed the Sh1,000.
TRANSACTION
“I was now tired yet they kept insisting that I took the money,” he said. Later, though, he received a call from the bureau informing him that the money lending company had cleared him.
“There was no further explanation but that transaction brought my credit score to BB, meaning my chance of defaulting is 40 per cent,” he added.
Mr Nduati is fighting to sort out his credit score because of a loan he never borrowed.
The businessman is the founder of Resolution Health Insurance Company and chief executive of Centric Air, a flying ambulance firm.
SH3 BILLION
His portfolio includes PineCreek Records and Trueblaq Entertainment. By January 2015, he had a Sh3 billion fortune.
Mr Nduati told a journalist four years ago that he follows the Sevens Rugby circuit around the world every year – travelling first-class.
“I travel to the United Arab Emirates, Vegas, London, Scotland and Hong Kong. I know it is an expensive venture but I can afford it. If I did not have money, I wouldn’t do it,” he said in the 2015 interview.