Which customer is going to default on their mortgage-interest? And what is the impact of something changing in the world? Keeping up with the pace of change is an almost superhuman task for the department of Guido Hendrikx, Manager Risk Modeling at Achmea Bank. That’s why nowadays he mainly leaves modeling to the computer. Which learned the trade partly thanks to Pipple’s expertise.
If there is one certainty in life, it is the mortgage payment every month, most homeowners will think. A bank experiences this in a slightly different way. Within their customer base there always is an earlier repayment or non-payment. Mortgage products change over time as well as the customer base and laws and regulations. In order to anticipate on all these possible changes, a lot of models are needed that require continuous updating.
Automate
With four people we are quite a small department’, Hendrikx says. In order to gain structural capacity, he called in Pipple. Initially to update a model. More assignments followed, each time succeeding in making processes more efficient. Pipple’s latest trick: at the push of a button, the model can be adapted to the latest insights. Saving Achmea Bank many months of work. In addition, Hendrikx’s team now reports the results more consistent. And, last but not least, they can report much faster to auditors and DNB on how certain factors influence the model.
At the push of a button, the model can be adapted to the latest insights. Saving Achmea Bank many months of work..
Spontaneous training
Pipple recognized there was not enough knowledge within the organization to get the most out of the data and open source platforms (such as R). They spontaneously trained fifteen people from Achmea Bank in three mornings. An extra service that Hendrikx had not anticipated. ‘Extraordinary’, he calls that gesture.
Open source
One of the things that makes Pipple so powerful, according to Hendrikx, is their smart use of open source solutions and the quality of the code. ‘All over the world, open source is used to built incredibly useful things. So you don’t have to reinvent the wheel. But that requires two things: you need to know where to look in the formulas and algorithms and you need to understand the solutions you find and tailor them to the client’s specific issues’. Pipple can do both, he claims.
In his opinion, the fact that Pipple is proficient in the latest techniques on the market is due to its excellent nose for the best mathematicians and econometricians. There are young people working there who are very passionate about solving complex problems. Each of them is analytically very strong. They’re also good communicators; they’re just really nice people’. Lars, ‘his’ Pipple consultant, has already been deployed on several assignments at Achmea Bank after completing his assignment with Hendrikx’s team. For example, he helped to implement a new model in the SAP environment. Hendrikx: ‘In every department where Lars was, he was able to convince with his knowledge and creativity.
