The Event
Schedule & Speakers
Venue & Hotel
Sponsors

Breakout 9: Breathe TCS: Beyond the Application: The use of Open Banking and AI Across the customer life cycle

12:05 PM - Monday, September 14
Anishnaabe B

This session will explore how consumer-consented data, Open Finance and AI can reshape credit risk and customer management across the full customer journey and lifespan of the relationship.

It will look at how richer, more current data can improve affordability assessment, identify emerging financial stress and fraud risks earlier, and reduce reliance on static documents and self-declared information.

The session will also examine one of the industry\'s biggest challenges: engagement. Better data only creates value if consumers are willing to participate, and AI and digital journeys can play a major role in making those interactions simpler, more relevant and more effective.

Finally, the presentation will consider the evolution toward a consumer-owned Financial Passport — a continuously updated view of financial capacity that can support better decisions, earlier intervention and better outcomes.

The key question: if we can understand financial difficulty earlier, why are we still waiting for the missed payment?

Speakers

Simon Howard

Linkedin
Simon Howard
Founder & CEO, Breathe Technology & Consulting Solutions and SMARTI&E

Simon Howard is the Founder and CEO of SmartI&E, a unique Open Banking and AI platform designed to understand consumer affordability across the entire customer lifecycle and connect consumers to the most appropriate pathway to resolution.
With more than 25 years of experience across credit risk, collections, data and digital transformation, Simon has held global consultant roles with organizations including Equifax and Experian and has worked across both the UK and Canadian financial services markets. He was part of the Experian team supporting early Open Banking consultancy and deployed the UK’s first digital affordability assessment solution for Santander and Clydesdale bank.
After arriving in Canada in 2018, Simon launched SWIPE, a digital engagement and payment solution, with partners illion DTS and Score Statistical, before focusing on the next evolution of customer engagement using AI and Open Banking. Simon is the co-owner of Canada’s affordability summit and a key member of the Canadian national roundtable focused on helping low income and marginalized Canadians gain better access to credit and financial support.
Today, Simon works with lenders, mortgage providers, collection agencies, insolvency professionals and other organisations to explore how real-time financial data and AI can be used throughout the customer lifecycle - not simply at the point of a credit decision.
A self-described “resolution enthusiast,” Simon is particularly interested in combining Open Banking and AI to identify financial stress earlier, reduce reliance on manual documents, improve engagement and help organisations find sustainable outcomes for consumers.