In a country with more than 68 million people in default, equivalent to a third of the total population, Serasa is holding the biggest debt negotiation event in the history of Brazil.
Considered an important part of the credit calendar in the country, especially for defaulters who in Brazil form a universe equivalent to the total population of the United Kingdom or France, the Feirão Serasa Limpa Nome (Clean Name Fair in English) is consolidated as one of the main events in Brazil.
What is Feirão Limpa Nome?
Feirão Limpa Nome is an event held annually by Serasa and is part of the actions of the largest online debt marketplace in Brazil, Serasa Limpa Nome.
The marketplace is a free service that connects more than 200 companies in Brazil with more than 70 million consumers who seek to negotiate their debts in a simple and fast way, without having to leave home and with special conditions (up to 90%), such as discounts and installments.
Last year, Serasa Limpa Nome brokered more than 32 million deals, an average of 88,000 per day, 61 per minute.
In November, Serasa Limpa Nome promoted the Debt Fair, an online event with discounts of up to 99%. It’s like a “Black Friday” for debts. It also had, for 5 days, a physical event with tents in the main Brazilian cities to help non digitalized people pay their debts.
As Experian’s Chief Financial Officer Lloyd Pitchford put it: “Limpa Nome is there to help people resolve historic debts, and it’s so humbling to see when we hold our credit fairs, the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people come out to meet with Experian to try and resolve those debts in a way that’s supportable for them but also meets the needs of their creditors.”
The records and innovations of the 2022 edition
With negotiations through Serasa’s digital channels taking place in November December , the 28th edition of the event has provided approximately 5.5 million so far. The goal is to achieve 7 million deals by the end of the event, thus closing the largest of all editions ever held. The goal is to surpass the 2021 Fair, which granted more than BRL 10 billion in discounts, enabled 5.8 million deals and benefited 4 million people.
The numbers of the Feirão 2022 will be record-setting.
We had a record number of participating companies – 267 – including banks, securitization companies (companies that buy debts), finance companies, retail, telecommunications companies, universities, and others. The number of partner companies are growing even more throughout the event.
- For the first time, Serasa made it possible to renegotiate basic debts, such as energy and solid waste tax. This year it was still a small offer, but already symbolic for what this debt segment represents in Brazil (27% of the total).
- The volume of offers available is estimated at more than 250 million, with average discounts of 70%.
- For the first time, Feirão Limpa Nome allowed payment with Pix, currently the main means of instant electronic payment in the country.
- Payments with Pix allowed, also for the first time, Serasa to offer the possibility of instantly writing off the negative debt – that is, the indebted person could have their name immediately removed from the credit bureaus, not having to wait longer for up to five business days, as provided by Brazilian legislation.
- For the first time, we made available the “Extrato Serasa” (Serasa Statement), a document in which consumers can prove that they no longer have debts in the company’s register.
Volunteers and emotion
Feirão Limpa Nome is only possible because Experian had an impressive mobilization of its employees and contractors. In addition to these, there was an army of more than 400 volunteers from all over Experian Brazil, who enlisted for the purpose of contributing to a better country.
The numbers were impressive and the final economic results were significant, but the most important are the stories of simple people that mark the days of physical fair. There were thousands of cases where users cried after the negotiation was done. They cried with relief at the end of a sacrifice and the resumption of a healthier economic life.
Consumers who benefit from this
This was the case, in the last fair, of Vagner da Silva, who managed to resolve a pending issue that had plagued him for 21 years, when his two children were born and he had to resort to overdraft and a bank loan. He left the Feirão Serasa Limpa Nome, in São Paulo, with a sense of relief. “For half my life my family and I suffered from this drama, a real knife to the head,” said Vagner, now 42. “Finally, we are free of this burden, we have a clean name”.
On the same occasion, the seamstress Terezinha de Jesus cried after getting a 90% discount and paying off a debt made by her ex-husband, in her document, when buying wheels for her car in the early 2000s. “My family likes the right things and I want, when God calls me, to be free, with my suitcase packed”, she told the main Brazilian News Portal, Grupo Globo’s G1, in a report that touched thousands of readers.
What’s next
We continue our journey to help consuemrs all over the world, and here in Brazil. Feirão Limpa Nome is just one of many programs Experian manages in the countries where it operates.
For more information on ways we are working to help consumers, please visit our United for Financial Health page here.