Definitions · Bilingual · Machine-readable
Hong Kong lending technology glossary
The most expensive mistake in a Hong Kong lending system purchase is usually not a missing feature — it is treating two different roles as the same thing, such as reading a credit reference agency as a loan management system, or reading “ready” as “compliant”. This glossary puts the Chinese and English names side by side and links the official source where one applies.
Terms
39 terms in four groups
Every term is published twice — as visible text and as a DefinedTerm node — sharing one anchor and one sentence.
- Credit reference and Credit Data Smart
- Lending systems and product categories
- Lending operations
- Data protection and controls
Credit reference and Credit Data Smart
These entities sit outside the lender. Confusing them with a lending system is the single most common mistake in a Hong Kong system purchase.
- Credit reference agency (CRA)
- An organisation that collects consumer credit data from credit providers and supplies credit-reference services, reports and scores back to them under the applicable framework. A CRA is a data source and service provider, not a lender's internal system.
- Selected CRA
- The term the Hong Kong Association of Banks uses for the consumer credit reference agencies selected to operate under the multiple-CRA model. "Licensed CRA" is not the term used; a vendor that says it is a "licensed CRA" is describing something that does not exist under this framework.
- Credit Data Smart (CDS)
- Hong Kong's consumer credit data platform and multiple-CRA operating model. CDS is infrastructure that credit providers and selected CRAs use. It is not a loan origination or loan management system, and a software vendor does not operate it.
- Credit Reference Platform (CRP)
- The data-exchange infrastructure layer that routes consumer credit data between credit providers and selected CRAs. CRP is plumbing, not a credit database a lender queries for its own operating workflow.
- Multiple Credit Reference Agencies model (MCRA)
- The operating model under which more than one selected CRA may hold and supply consumer credit data, rather than a single agency holding the whole market's records.
- Credit provider
- The institution that actually extends credit to a borrower — a bank, a finance company or a licensed money lender. The credit provider, not its software vendor, is responsible for what it submits, when, and whether it is accurate.
- Subscribed member
- A credit provider that has joined a credit-reference arrangement and is therefore able to contribute and access consumer credit data under its rules. Membership is held by the credit provider itself.
- Credit report
- A consumer credit reference product issued by a CRA describing an individual's credit history. Lending software may record that a report was obtained and by whom; it does not issue one.
- Credit score
- A CRA-produced numeric summary of consumer credit risk. Distinct from a lender's own internal scorecard or affordability calculation, which stays inside the lender's policy.
- CDS-ready data
- Application, approved-term and repayment records held in a complete, consistent, exportable structure so a credit provider's own credit-data workflow can start from clean data. Readiness is an operating state. It is not compliance, and it does not transfer the submission duty away from the credit provider.
- Credit-data submission
- The act of a credit provider sending consumer credit data into the credit-reference arrangement on the required cycle. The duty, the timing and the accuracy sit with the credit provider.
- Common Module
- A shared component of the credit-reference arrangement through which participating institutions interact with the platform on standard terms rather than building a bespoke path each.
- Direct Channel API
- A programmatic interface an eligible participating institution may use to exchange credit data directly, as an alternative to a shared or file-based route. Eligibility belongs to the institution, not to its software supplier.
Lending systems and product categories
Product-category labels overlap heavily in Hong Kong. Evaluate the operating workflow a system actually covers, not the acronym on the brochure.
- Loan origination system (LOS)
- The system that carries an application from intake through documents, identity checks, affordability assessment, credit review, human approval, terms and the hand-off to disbursement. Its work is heaviest before money leaves the lender.
- Loan management system (LMS)
- The system that runs active loans: schedules, instalments, repayment notices, arrears, reconciliation, settlement, restructuring and portfolio reporting. Its work is heaviest after disbursement.
- Loan CRM
- Customer-relationship software adapted to lending: leads, contacts, follow-ups and pipeline. It manages relationships, not the loan book, the approval record or the repayment ledger.
- Lending operations system
- The wider operating layer that joins intake, staff review, borrower records, repayment operations, multi-company oversight, permissions and auditability into one workflow. It overlaps LOS and LMS rather than replacing the idea of either. Covenant Desk is a lending operations system.
- Licensed money lender
- A lender licensed under Hong Kong's money lending regime and subject to its licence conditions. Licence conditions, not software features, define what the lender must be able to evidence.
- Finance company
- A Hong Kong consumer or commercial lending business, frequently operating several licensed entities under common ownership — which is why multi-company scoping matters more here than in single-entity markets.
- Multi-company federation
- Running several lending companies from one login while keeping books, permissions and borrower visibility scoped per company, with a group-level view for owners.
- Softmedia overlay
- Keeping an existing Softmedia loan ledger as the book of record while borrower, repayment and management workflows move to a newer system — an alternative to a single risky ledger cut-over. Covenant Desk is not affiliated with Softmedia.
- Source-system sync
- An agreed, field-mapped data flow between an existing ledger or spreadsheet set and a new operating system. Every connection should start from a written source mapping, not a generic "integration" claim.
Lending operations
The day-to-day work that happens after an application arrives and after money goes out.
- Loan servicing
- Administering a loan after disbursement: applying repayments, maintaining balances, issuing statements and notices, and handling early settlement or restructuring.
- Repayment operations
- The daily work of collecting instalments: notice runs, payment matching, reconciliation of bank and FPS receipts, arrears follow-up and exception handling.
- Credit underwriting
- Assessing whether to lend, how much and on what terms, using income, existing commitments, affordability, credit-reference input and the lender's policy. The final decision is the lender's.
- Borrower record
- The single identity a lender keeps for a person or company, joining applications, approved terms, documents, repayments and communications. Duplicate borrower records are the usual root cause of wrong exposure figures.
- Customer 360
- One screen showing everything a lender holds about a borrower across applications, loans, documents, repayments and messages, subject to that member of staff's permissions.
- Repayment notice
- A dated communication telling a borrower what is due, when and how to pay. Consolidated notices matter when one borrower holds several loans across related companies.
- Delinquency
- A loan behind its contractual repayment schedule. Ageing buckets, not a single arrears flag, are what let a lender see whether a book is deteriorating.
- Settlement
- Closing a loan by paying the outstanding balance, whether on schedule or early. Early settlement usually changes the interest calculation and needs its own recorded figure.
- Write-off
- Recognising that a balance is not expected to be recovered. A write-off is an accounting and policy decision; it does not by itself end the underlying record or any reporting obligation.
- Cross-company exposure
- The total a single borrower owes across several related lending companies. Visible only if borrower identity is deduplicated and the lender has enabled and justified cross-company visibility.
Data protection and controls
Who may see what, who is answerable for it, and what evidence exists afterwards.
- Audit trail
- The recorded history of who viewed, changed, approved or exported a record, when, and under which company scope. Evidence for an internal or external reviewer — not, by itself, a compliance certification.
- Role-based access control (RBAC)
- Granting access by job role rather than per person, so identity data, approval rights, export rights and company scope can be reviewed and revoked as a set when someone changes role or leaves.
- Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance (PDPO)
- Hong Kong's personal data protection statute, supplemented for lending by the Code of Practice on Consumer Credit Data. Software can support the controls the PDPO expects; it cannot make an organisation compliant.
- Consent
- The borrower's recorded agreement to a stated use of their personal data. What matters operationally is the version, the wording, the channel and the timestamp — not merely that a box was ticked.
- Data controller
- The party that decides why and how personal data is processed. For borrower data in a lending system, that is the lender. Borrower data belongs to the lender, not to the software supplier.
- Data processor
- The party that processes personal data on the controller's instructions. A lending software supplier acts in this role for the lender's borrower data and must not repurpose it.
- Data retention
- How long personal data is kept before deletion, decided by the controller against its own legal and operating requirements and applied consistently across live records, exports and backups.
Primary sources
Official sources and editorial note
Regulatory statements on this page link to the Hong Kong government or regulator material available on the review date. Requirements can change; each institution should check its own current licence conditions and take legal or compliance advice. This page is not legal advice. Read our editorial, sourcing and corrections policy.
Responsible publisher: Covenant Desk (the Covenant Desk product team) · 2026-08-21
- Hong Kong Association of Banks: selected credit reference agencies
- Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau: consultation conclusions on enhanced regulation of money lenders
- Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data: Code of Practice on Consumer Credit Data
- Companies Registry: money lender licensing conditions and guidance
Next step
With the terms separated, look at the actual workflow.
The Covenant Desk product map puts each module’s capabilities next to its limits, and a demo lets you check both against the real screens.
Covenant Desk is lending operations software. It does not provide loans, issue credit reports or replace the lender’s final credit decision.