Personal loans provide borrowers with quick access to extra cash for emergencies, personal purchases, or other uses. Reputable lenders usually offer fast approval times, so you can have the funds in your account within a day or less. However, as with any loan, you need to provide paper in order to be approved for a personal loan.

These documents may include identification documents as well as other types of evidence.

Identification documents

The lender will usually require at least 100 points of identification. Acceptable identification documents usually include the following:

• Driver’s licence – A current driver’s licence can be used to provide evidence of your current residential address, your age, and your name.
• Passport – Lenders may require borrowers to be permanent residents (PR) or citizens of Australia. Your passport can be used as evidence of your status as a PR or citizen of Australia. A citizenship certificate might also suffice as evidence of your status in Australia.
• Other photo ID – A lender will usually require some form of photo identification to confirm your identity. Acceptable documents could include a Proof of Age Card, a university student card, and/or your passport or driver’s licence.
• Birth certificate – You can use your birth certificate as evidence of your age.
• Other identification documents – Other types of identification documents that may be used include Medicare cards, ATM cards, credit cards, club cards, recent utilities bills, recent rates notices, recent tax assessment notices, and Centrelink Pension cards. You might also be able to use documents such as signed rental agreements or mortgage documents.

Identification documents are used to confirm your age, as lenders usually lend only to those aged 18 or over. These ID documents may also be used to verify at you have been at your current address for at least three months, which is a common lending criterion for personal loans.

Other paperwork

Identification documents are used to establish basic eligibility criteria such as age, residence, and citizenship status. However, you will need to provide other types of paperwork to secure a personal loan. These documents are used to verify that you can repay the loan without hardship.

Proof of Income

Payslips, bank statements, tax returns prepared by your tax agent, notices of assessment, employment contracts and PAYG summaries from your employer are some of the types of documents that can be used to provide evidence of your income.

Borrowers who are self-employed can use tax returns, tax assessment notice, business tax returns and business balance sheets to show they are able to repay the loan.

Other types of income can be evidenced with documents such as signed leases (rental income), tax returns (for investment and other income), bank statements showing rental or investment returns, shareholding statements, and tax returns. Evidence of assets such as property or cars could also be used.