New Client Announcement – Finclusion

New motor finance lender adopts conversational AI affordability technology at origination, setting a new standard for responsible lending

Finclusion, a new entrant to the UK motor finance market, has partnered with Inicio AI, creators of a virtual agent, Budgie, trained to help customers complete a detailed affordability assessment in a conversational manner at the very start of the customer journey. 

This marks an important step forward for the motor finance sector, where affordability assessments have traditionally relied heavily on indirect indicators such as credit data and scorecards.

By introducing a conversational AI affordability assessment at origination, Finclusion is establishing a model designed to deliver greater transparency, deeper financial understanding, and improved customer outcomes from the outset. 

Inicio AI technology enables lenders to engage customers in structured, explainable conversations about their financial circumstances, providing a clearer and more complete picture of affordability to support responsible lending decisions.

While Inicio’s platform has been widely adopted to support customers experiencing financial difficulty, Finclusion’s implementation represents a significant evolution, using conversational affordability proactively, before lending decisions are made.

Chris Bosworth – CEO of Finclusion, said:
“As a new lender, we have the opportunity to design our customer journey around responsible lending from day one. Partnering with Inicio AI allows us to embed affordability at the very start of that journey, ensuring we build a clear and transparent understanding of each customer’s financial position. This is fundamental to our commitment to delivering sustainable outcomes and building long-term trust with our customers.”

 The partnership comes at a pivotal time for the motor finance sector, as lenders face increasing focus on affordability assessments and customer outcomes.

 By embedding affordability assessments into its origination process, Finclusion is helping to establish a forward-looking approach aligned with evolving regulatory expectations and best practice.

 Rachel Curtis, CEO of Inicio, said:
“We are proud to support Finclusion in embedding affordability at the earliest stage of the lending journey. This represents an important shift in how affordability is approached within motor finance, moving from a reactive exercise to a proactive foundation. Finclusion’s approach demonstrates how lenders can use technology to strengthen responsible lending and deliver better outcomes for customers.”

 This partnership reflects a shared commitment between Finclusion and Inicio to improve how affordability is understood and assessed across the lending lifecycle.

 As the motor finance sector continues to evolve, initiatives such as this demonstrate how lenders can combine technology and intent to establish new standards in responsible lending.

 Rupert Lyle, Fund Principal of West Midlands Co-Investment Fund from Future Planet Capital Regional, said: 

“Future Planet Capital Regional is delighted to support the combination of Finclusion and Inicio. It brings together two businesses focused on using technology to better understand customers and embed responsible lending from the very start of the journey. As scrutiny around affordability continues to grow, approaches like this — combining transparency, technology and intent — have the potential to set a higher standard for the sector.” 

Blog -Setting a New Standard in Motor Finance

Finclusion Introduces Innovative Assessments at the Start of the Customer Journey

The UK motor finance sector is undergoing one of the most significant periods of reflection and change in its history.

In recent years, questions around affordability, transparency, and customer outcomes have moved sharply into focus. Large-scale redress schemes and increased regulatory scrutiny have highlighted the need for lenders to demonstrate not only compliance, but genuine understanding of a customer’s ability to sustain borrowing.

This moment is not just about addressing the past. It is about shaping the future.

Against this backdrop, a new generation of lenders is emerging, organisations building their models around responsible lending from the outset, rather than adapting retrospectively. Finclusion is one such lender.

Designing affordability in from day one

As a new entrant to the motor finance market, Finclusion has made a deliberate decision to embed affordability assessments at the very start of the customer journey, working in partnership with Inicio AI.

This marks a significant departure from traditional approaches, where affordability assessments have often relied heavily on only indirect data sources such as credit files, scorecards, and income estimates.

Finclusion is introducing conversational affordability assessments creating an additional transparent and structured way to understand a customer’s financial position before lending decisions are finalised. 

This allows affordability to be assessed not simply as a compliance checkpoint, but as a meaningful part of responsible lending.

Moving affordability upstream

Inicio’s conversational AI platform has historically been deployed to support customers during periods of financial difficulty, helping lenders engage sensitively, understand individual circumstances, and agree sustainable outcomes.

Finclusion’s implementation represents a new and important evolution.

By introducing Inicio’s affordability solution at origination, Finclusion is proactively building deeper financial understanding into the lending process itself. 

This shift moves affordability from a reactive exercise to a proactive foundation.

It reflects a belief that better conversations at the start of the journey can lead to better outcomes throughout the life of the agreement.

Setting a new tone for motor finance

As regulatory expectations continue to evolve, lenders face increasing responsibility to demonstrate not only that affordability has been assessed, but that it has been assessed appropriately.

Finclusion’s approach reflects a forward-looking perspective, recognising that responsible lending is not just about meeting regulatory requirements, but about building sustainable relationships with customers. 

By embedding conversational affordability from the outset, Finclusion is helping to establish a model built on clarity, understanding, and transparency.

A shared commitment to better outcomes

Inicio is proud to support Finclusion in this important step.

This partnership reflects a shared commitment to improving how affordability is understood and assessed, ensuring customers are supported appropriately from the very beginning of their journey.

As the motor finance sector continues to evolve, initiatives like this demonstrate how technology and lender intent can work together to set new standards for responsible lending.

Blog – Customer capacity fluctuates daily – systems rarely do

Blog – Customer capacity fluctuates daily – systems rarely do.

By Amani Darr

In affordability support, intent is rarely the issue. Most organisations genuinely want to do the right thing for customers facing financial pressure or challenging life circumstances. What’s often underestimated is how much the format of support determines whether customers engage at all.

Having worked in and around the vulnerability and affordability space for several years, one thing has become increasingly clear – customers don’t delay seeking help because solutions don’t exist. They delay because, in that moment, the way support is offered doesn’t feel safe or manageable.

The first barrier is emotional, not structural

By 2026, digital engagement is no longer an alternative channel – it’s the norm. But for customers with additional support needs, this shift isn’t just about convenience – it’s about control, dignity, and timing.

Research from StepChange Debt Charity shows that 92% of customers wish they’d sought debt advice sooner (2023 Client Insight Report). The reasons they didn’t are well documented – shame, stigma, fear of judgement, and uncertainty about what would happen next.

For many, the challenge isn’t knowing they need support – it’s finding a way to engage that feels manageable on that particular day.

Capacity fluctuates. One day someone may feel able to speak to a person. On another, digital engagement without the pressure of real-time human interaction might feel like the only manageable option. And on particularly difficult days, even small decisions can feel overwhelming. In those moments the ability to pause, step away, and return later isn’t a convenience – it’s the difference between engaging and disengaging entirely.

This is why our solution was designed the way it was – not to remove human support, but to create safer and more equitable first steps into engagement. Omni-channel support isn’t about offering everything to everyone. It’s about recognising that an individual with additional support needs’ resource fluctuates – and that forcing engagement through a single route can unintentionally raise barriers.

Vulnerability is dynamic, our systems often aren’t

One of the most persistent operational challenges I’ve seen is how vulnerability is treated once identified.

Too often it becomes a static flag – applied once, recorded, relied upon indefinitely or even forgotten altogether. Vulnerability is not a segment, it’s a spectrum. People move in and out of it depending on life events, stress, financial shocks, and confidence. Someone may cope well one week and struggle the next. Affordability pressures, mental load, and decision-making capacity can vary day to day.

When organisations rely solely on fixed classifications, they risk missing this nuance. Support models built around consistency can unintentionally fail people whose lived experience is anything but consistent.

The wider issue is visibility. If organisations cannot see how customers actually experience and move through affordability journeys – the hesitation, the abandoned steps, the partial disclosures, it becomes very difficult to design meaningfully better support. Without visibility of friction, improvement to customer outcomes is largely guesswork.

For example, a customer may abandon an affordability form three times before completing it. That pattern isn’t non-compliance – it’s an early-warning sign.

We can’t improve what we won’t see.

Where Conversational AI can genuinely help

AI is often discussed in extremes, either as a replacement for human support or as a silver bullet for vulnerability. Neither is strictly true – used responsibly its value lies elsewhere.

Conversational AI platforms can create space for customers to engage earlier and more comfortably, capturing context in their own words and language. Rather than forcing disclosure into a single high-pressure interaction, engagement can unfold gradually.

With the Inicio solution, it means customers can progress through affordability conversations in a way that feels manageable to them – pausing, returning, and reviewing when needed.

Importantly, AI tools don’t need to determine whether someone is vulnerable. Instead, they can supplement existing knowledge by capturing signals that may indicate whether an individual has additional support needs – hesitation, repeated uncertainty, or difficulty progressing – and preserving that information in a way so that organisations and specialist teams can respond fairly and appropriately.

From auditability to empathy

One often overlooked benefit of Conversational AI platforms is the audit trail they create. Not just of actions taken, but of conversations held.

Reviewing what a customer has said, how they engage, and where friction occurred provides organisations with far richer insight than a binary flag ever could. It allows trained teams to spot patterns, consider context, and apply judgement more effectively.

When organisations can access this fuller picture of engagement – not just outcomes, but the journey itself – it creates a different type of internal conversation. The focus becomes less about customer “non-compliance” and more about structural friction. Instead of asking why someone didn’t engage, teams can begin asking what in the experience made engagement harder than it needed to be.

Whilst exceedingly important, auditability isn’t just about compliance. It’s a vital bridge between digital engagement and human empathy.

From reactive contact to proactive engagement

As conversational technologies evolve, there is an opportunity to move beyond static vulnerability markers towards more responsive, context-driven support models.

This doesn’t mean the automation of care, or necessarily the reduction of human involvement. It means increasing visibility so organisations can adapt to customers whose needs may shift from one day, or even week, to the next.

Affordability support has never been limited by intent, it has often been limited by format. If we recognise that vulnerability is dynamic, then our systems must be capable of responding dynamically too.

Designing engagement around how customers actually behave – rather than how we expect them to behave – enables earlier intervention, reduces avoidable harm, and creates fairer, more sustainable outcomes for both customers and organisations.

Tools like the Inicio solution form part of that shift – not as a replacement for human care, but as infrastructure that makes better care possible.

Amani Darr - Head of Customer Success

New Client Announcement – BNP Paribas Personal Finance

Our journey with BNP Paribas Personal Finance started with the support of  SuperTech West Midlands who recruited us into the BNP Paribas Personal Finance Innovation Lab in 2024. 

It was a fantastic journey where we had the opportunity to hear directly from teams within BNP Paribas Personal Finance, helping us shape our unique solution to their specific needs.

Now we are proud to have BNP Paribas Personal Finance as our client, supporting their customers to complete affordability assessments using our bespoke conversational AI, built from in-depth research and years of detailed conversations around everyday financial circumstances and challenges.

Our partnership is a fantastic example of how purpose led organisations such as SuperTech and Industry led innovation labs can bring founders straight into the heart of commercial organisations with focused innovative ambitions.