Showcase Your Annual Social Impact: How SpringFour ESG Reporting Drives Your Goals
What do ESG, CSR, Social Impact, and Sustainability Reports have in common? The goal of empowering people.
From paying utility bills and putting food on the table to finding affordable healthcare and disaster relief, it goes without saying that navigating finances plays a fundamental role in everyone’s lives. However, what this looks like varies from one person to another.
PYMNTS recently shared data showing 25% of paycheck-to-paycheck consumers struggle to pay their monthly bills and 43% of all consumers have changed their financial lifestyle in the last two years. A recent MarketWatch survey showed almost 50% of Americans consider themselves broke and 66.2% share that they are living paycheck to paycheck.
Consumers and stakeholders now expect that organizations prioritize empathy with their consumers and employees by providing financial health solutions. That is why more and more organizations are documenting these efforts and demonstrating accountability by sharing impact metrics in their own reporting.
Social impact is gaining increasing recognition across various industries, particularly within the financial sector. There are several ways organizations are sharing their impact with stakeholders:
➡️ Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Reports
➡️ Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Reports
➡️ Sustainability Reports
➡️ And other organization-specific reports
Despite their different formats, these reports share a common focus on the people and communities they serve. SpringFour’s Client ESG Reporting shares this social impact goal and delivers metrics that can be included throughout the social (S) and governance (G) sections of organizations’ annual impact reporting. Our Client ESG Reporting empowers organizations to showcase accountability by measuring the support they provide with SpringFour’s financial health solutions.
SpringFour makes it easy for organizations to support their consumers and employees with financial health resources. SpringFour empowers organizations to build trust with their consumers by providing 23,500 vetted nonprofit and government resources in 25+ financial health categories like food savings, heating and utility savings, affordable childcare, prescription savings, transportation, and more. Consumers and employees who receive our local resource referrals also find a sense of security in the confidentiality and privacy SpringFour provides, as personally identifiable information (PII) is never collected or stored.
Additional ways SpringFour enhances consumer-organization relationships:
Our Founder and CEO, Rochelle Nawrocki Gorey, emphasizes the importance of making consumers aware of opportunities for assistance that exist, saying:
“Since day one, we have known this: people need and deserve access to resources that help them find their way out of financial hardship.”
Nonprofit and government resources already exist to support consumers across the country, but many people are unaware of what resources are available or where to turn for trusted support. SpringFour empowers organizations with a trustworthy source for consumers to access financial health support. SpringFour’s Resource Integrity Team continuously vets and curates the resources available through SpringFour so that our clients can rest assured their consumers have a trustworthy source to turn to.
Our Reporting Helps Organizations Achieve Their Goals
ESGtheReport shares:
“With ESG becoming increasingly important in the market, companies that embrace these initiatives can meet competitive challenges. Ultimately, this creates value for the organization as it is able to create long-term sustainability and resilience while meeting customer’s expectations…Additionally, companies that have implemented ESG initiatives are more likely to attract high-quality employees and investors as they become more attractive to those stakeholders.”
As organizations continue establishing their roles as corporate citizens, their shareholders, internal teams, and other stakeholders are benefiting from growing returns on investment such as reducing net credit losses, increasing brand loyalty, empowering employees, improving bottom lines, and much more.
Real results include:
➡️ More than 5x ROI
➡️ Millions in projected annualized credit loss benefits
➡️ $1,000 reduction per customer in annual net credit losses on average
➡️ 17-31% increase in repayment rates
➡️ 7 percentage point increase in Net Promoter Scores (NPS)
Every year, SpringFour delivers Client ESG Reporting that helps organizations drive and measure the impact they’ve achieved with SpringFour. SpringFour’s Client ESG Reports provide metrics based on the use of their organization’s SpringFour product(s).
Included in SpringFour’s Client ESG Reports are key impact metrics such as:
By sharing this data in our Client ESG Reporting, organizations can better understand and support different segments of their market. Our clients have seen measurable benefits such as increased repayment rates, reduced delinquencies, increased participation in foreclosure prevention programs, and more as a result of their SpringFour partnership.
SpringFour also shares individual clients’ usage data, SpringFour aggregate data, and U.S. market trends with our clients so they can analyze consumer trends, develop effective messaging campaigns, facilitate productive customer support, deliver the most relevant financial health resources, and continue relieving consumer stress.
While our primary focus within ESG is social impact (S), SpringFour also supports organizations’ governance (G) by providing impact metrics that can be shared with internal teams for strategic planning, with stakeholders for highlighting measurable impact, and in self-reporting to highlight your organization’s dedication to strengthening social impact and holding organizations and their leadership teams accountable.
Clients Featuring SpringFour’s Impact in Their Reporting
Many of our clients are currently showcasing their partnerships with SpringFour. Mentions of SpringFour partnerships and their impact are featured throughout our clients’ reporting about their influence on people and society, often showcased in ESG, CSR, Annual, or Sustainability Reports.
In Fifth Third Bank’s 2023 Sustainability Report, SpringFour’s impact is highlighted through our partnership with Fifth Third on its annual eBus initiative, which brings a mobile banking experience to underserved communities on a bus called the Financial Empowerment Mobile. This year’s enhanced eBus experience included SpringFour, creating a unique opportunity to introduce and provide SpringFour resources in person to consumers in underserved communities. In addition, Fifth Third Bank also cited SpringFour’s military resources as an important part of their efforts to support military members and families who visited the eBus.
Capital One mentioned their partnership with SpringFour as a Key Accomplishment in the Social Impact section of Capital One’s 2023 Environmental Social Governance (ESG) Report. The report shared this powerful quote:
“Together, Capital One and SpringFour are leading the charge to make financial health a part of financial institutions’ offerings to customers and in doing so, create a more inclusive, accessible, and equitable financial ecosystem for all.”
In BMO’s 2023 Sustainability Report, under the ‘Financial Inclusion’ focus area, BMO highlights its partnership with SpringFour which helps BMO offer equitable and accessible banking solutions to underserved communities.
M&T Bank’s 2023 Sustainability Report features a compelling quote from M&T’s Loss Mitigation Liaison, Chrissy Lucas, emphasizing the bank’s gratitude for implementing SpringFour. M&T Bank also highlights metrics from last year’s SpringFour Client Social Impact Report. This included delivering 223,000+ financial health referrals to their customers in 2023.
“Feedback from qualifying customers has been positive. They love having additional resources to help reduce their bills, especially because it isn’t a one-and-done program. Some borrowers have seen their heating and utility bills entirely paid thanks to local resources provided through SpringFour. In my opinion, this is one of the best tools offered by the bank.”
Flagstar’s ESG Report 2023 highlights how the bank meets customer expectations by partnering with SpringFour to offer accessible banking services. Over 94,500 Flagstar customers received more than 484,500 referrals to SpringFour’s financial health resources in 2023. Flagstar’s most requested areas of assistance included support for food savings, mortgage relief, housing counseling, and utility costs.
KeyBank’s 2023 CSR Report used metrics from its SpringFour ESG Report to demonstrate the partnership’s impact in 2023. KeyBank’s customers’ four most requested financial health categories were housing counseling, heating and utility costs, financial counseling, and employment services.
In Patelco’s 2023 Annual Report, SpringFour is featured as a key partner to help its members with everyday expenses by referring them to SpringFour for their day-to-day needs. Patelco also included a QR code within its Annual Report that links to SpringFour’s S4direct where consumers can access immediate, self-serve assistance.
Read reports from BMO, Capital One, Fifth Third Bank, Flagstar, KeyBank, M&T, and Patelco to see how SpringFour helps these organizations drive financial health and social impact.
Agents, Counselors, & Consumers See the Difference
We have received inspiring feedback from users firsthand about how SpringFour has impacted and uplifted lives. The testimonials below have been shared by consumers, agents, counselors, and coaches using SpringFour’s products to grow financial health. The variety of stories and positive feedback we receive highlights SpringFour’s broad range of financial health offerings. People facing financial hardship often need support in more than one area. SpringFour empowers organizations to connect consumers with the resources they need in their own communities.
A contact center agent used SpringFour resources to help a woman safely leave a domestic violence situation with two young children and a newborn baby. SpringFour’s vetted resources helped her locate an affordable apartment and get assistance with rent, utility bills, affordable childcare, and groceries. With these resources, she was able to build a safe and healthy environment for her and her children after a difficult experience.
“Truly almost every day I get gratitude from claimants that we offer these resources. Most of our claimants are out of work due to a disability and they are scared, lost and lonely. Being able to tell them there is help and hope out there gives them just enough to keep pushing forward.”
“This is a wonderful resource. It can be hard to find assistance for individuals like myself who don’t qualify because we surpass the income threshold. When life happens, we often find ourselves drowning or barely making it, with huge financial repercussions that take years to recover. SpringFour is providing resources and referrals for individuals like me in need, as well. Overall, it’s wonderful — thank you.”
“At this time, I don’t need any resources, but it is so nice to see that a credit card company really does care. Having these resources at your fingertips makes life that much easier.”
These testimonials show that SpringFour drives real impact for consumers, employees, and organizations. Everyone deserves access to financial health support when they need it. When you transform how consumers manage their finances by advocating for social impact and taking corporate responsibility, your organization will reap benefits in return.
SpringFour distributes its annual Client ESG Reports in February, providing insights for each specific client from the previous calendar year.
We would love to connect with your ESG, CSR, Sustainability, or Impact teams to ensure they receive this report and can continue making access to financial wellness an industry standard.
Please reach out to SpringFour’s Senior Manager, Client Success and Impact at phylicia@springfour.com to connect your ESG teams with ours and learn more about SpringFour’s Client ESG Reports and overall impact reporting.
Phylicia Clifton
Senior Manager, Client Success & Impact, SpringFour
Awards and Recognition
