Lenders must verify the identity of their applicants and establish some basic facts about their applicant’s finances to enable them to lend responsibly. They also need to fulfil their legal responsibilities and comply with Money Laundering regulations. They use CRAs to help them do this. They check their applicant’s credit history to establish if previous credit agreements have been repaid on time, and to check their current financial commitments. This assists them in establishing whether the applicant has the ability to repay the credit they are applying for without causing over-commitment. They also check the files of a CRA to help them identify fraudulent applications.