Oportun’s response to COVID-19 fact sheet                                                                                              

April 3, 2020

Oportun is a mission-driven Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI). We provide inclusive, affordable financial services to hardworking, low-to-moderate-income individuals, enabling them to move forward in their lives, demonstrate their creditworthiness, and establish the credit history they need to access new opportunities. Oportun serves U.S. customers in English and Spanish; online and over the phone in 19 states, and in person at more than 300 retail locations across 12 of those 19 states.

Here to safely serve our community

As a financial services provider, Oportun is deemed to be part of an “Essential Critical Infrastructure Sector” by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and we are expected to maintain our operations and work schedules for essential personnel. The health and safety of our employees and customers is paramount as we fulfill our responsibility of maintaining operations in order to support customers in need.

We closely follow all public health orders from local, state and federal officials, including the Center for Disease Control, to ensure we are taking all necessary healthcare precautions and maintaining compliance in this rapidly changing environment. In places where emergency orders require non-essential personnel to work from home, we have instructed our corporate employees to do so and these teams have seamlessly adapted to working remotely.

We have made clear to all our employees that they can choose to stay home at any point if that is the best decision for them and their family. In those cases, employees have PTO and paid sick time to draw upon. In the event they choose to stay beyond that time, they may file for a leave of absence without pay. In all circumstances, there will be no corrective action for these absences. The choice to work or not for these essential employees is entirely their own.

To protect the health and safety of everyone in all our retail locations, we have done the following

• Clean and sanitize our facilities every day and encourage employees to use hand sanitizer after every customer interaction.
• Enforce social distancing by limiting the number of people in our stores as recommended and asking everyone to remain six or more feet apart from others.
• Posted signs at our entrances asking customers not to enter the location if they are ill, and to avoid touching their nose, eyes and mouth when counting money.
• Taken steps to install plexiglass screens on our retail counters.
• Actively encourage all our customers to interact with us online or over the phone instead of in person and making it more convenient for them to do so.
• Continually implement additional safety measures as required by federal, state, and local health authorities.

Protecting the financial health of our customers

Just as we did during the last recession more than a decade ago, and when our customers were impacted by natural disasters like Hurricane Harvey and the California wildfires, Oportun is taking proactive steps to support our customers today. Including:

• Offering payment deferrals, loan modifications and waiving fees for customers in need.
• Following applicable regulatory requirements, including the CARES act, regarding credit reporting for those customers who informed us they are impacted by this situation.
• Encouraging customers to interact with us online or by phone and waiving third-party payment fees for all customers to ensure they have access to multiple payment locations and digital options free of charge.
• Offering all customers free, personalized financial coaching as well as access to helpful local resources  in both English and Spanish through our community program partners.
• Sharing information on how to avoid fraud and gain access to free assistance that is offered in their community.

Protecting the health and livelihood of our employees:

Oportun is committed to promoting the health and livelihoods of our 3,000+ employees, and we have taken proactive steps to expand the benefits we provide in order to help them through this challenging time.

• We are providing a meaningful short-term increase in the take-home pay of our hourly retail employees as a sign of appreciation for their commitment to serving our customers in person during this crisis.
• In the event that an employee’s work facility is forced to close due to COVID-19 and that employee is unable to work from home due to the nature of their job, Oportun has offered to provide supplemental pay of up to 14 days.
• For our essential employees who are continuing to work in our locations, Oportun has offered to reimburse supplemental childcare expenses that are the result of COVID-19 related school closures.
• All our employees may choose to stay home at any point if that is the best decision for them and their family in this situation, and there will be no corrective action for these absences. The choice to work or not for these essential employees is entirely their own.
• In addition, we are closely tracking and quickly implementing, U.S. and Mexico federal, state and local guidelines regarding COVID-19 and our employees’ health and livelihood.
• The company has committed $100,000 in support of the Oportun Employee Assistance Fund and expanded eligibility criteria for Oportun employees to receive assistance for hardships related to COVID-19. This 501(c)3 nonprofit fund was established by the company long before the current situation, and provides cash support for emergency needs like food, rent and mortgage relief. Many of our employees actively support the fund through their own charitable giving which has surged in the weeks since COVID-19 began impacting the economy.
• We are providing access to free financial coaching and other local resources through our national program partners.
• We are actively cross-training many of our employees so that they can support the parts of our business that are seeing a surge in demand even as the virus disrupts their core areas of focus. As a result of these and other steps the company has taken, no one at Oportun has been laid off due to the impacts of COVID-19.

Supporting our community

Oportun is here to serve our community, as we face this unprecedented challenge together. We understand our responsibility to take action as the needs in our community continue to escalate.

Oportun has committed a total of $250,000 in donations to directly address this pandemic, including $150,000 in charitable grants for community-based efforts by nonprofits serving the most vulnerable families impacted by COVID-19, and a $100,000 grant to the Oportun Employee Assistance Fund.