Medical emergency has emerged as one of the top reasons for people availing personal loans in India. Be it in the main urban cities or the smaller cities of India, more than 30% of people who availed of personal loans utilised the funds for medical emergencies, most likely driven by COVID-19 and related conditions, revealed new data from SimplyCash, the HeroFinCorp-powered instant personal loan app.
Demand for medical emergency loans spread across Indian cities
According to SimplyCash, 31% of people who availed of personal loans used the funds for medical emergencies. The average ticket size of the instant personal loans disbursed by SimplyCash ranged between Rs 1,50,000 and Rs 50,000.
Interestingly, the use of personal loans for medical emergencies is not just a metro city phenomenon. A similar pattern can be observed across non-metro cities as well.
Sample this. Rajkot (47%) and Ahmedabad (46%) recorded higher numbers of personal loan applicants seeking funds for medical emergencies, as compared to metro cities such as Kolkata (44%), Hyderabad (37%) and Chennai (36%). People in tier-2 cities such as Patna (31%) and Jaipur (27%) were along the same lines as those seeking personal loans, to manage medical requirements, probably due to the COVID crisis, in metros such as New Delhi (31%), Bengaluru (28%) and Mumbai (25%).
Technology drives loan disbursement in times of need
At a time when several lenders have stopped giving loans – medical and non-medical – SimplyCash has been finding its way into different cities of India. One of the reasons for this has been the high-end technology and innovation that drive this platform.
When medical emergencies strike, there is no time to visit a bank’s branch, or talk to the executives, or fill lengthy applications. With the SimplyCash app, consumers did not have to do that. They could apply for a loan on the app even from the emergency ward of a hospital, and still receive funds on time.
“The second surge of COVID has been very hard on all of us. And it is in these times when the power of presence-less Digital lending has helped the people the most. We are glad we could serve our customers in these difficult times,” explains Prashant Chopra, National Manager, Digital, Hero FinCorp.
