Author Archives: Editor

Wescot | CCR’s Latest Big Name Sponsor

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CCR, or Credits Collections and Risk magazine is the UK’s most read publication regarding the credit industry. Since 2008 and the dawn of the recession, credit and debt have been hotly debated subjects throughout the media. CCR has regularly reported every month on the changes made to the industry as it goes through an extended period of upheaval. The magazine presents information to not just the credit industry but to customers as well, acknowledging any queries that they might have with regards to debt and how to manage it. Each year, CCR also presents a one day conference, entitled CCR-Interactive and many large names in credit make an appearance to network and expand their client base.

With the success of the CCR-Interactive event growing each year, then it has been important for CCR to secure funding from outside sources. They recently announced a new sponsor of the event to be Wescot, the largest debt recovery company in Britain. Based in Glasgow, Hull and Saltcoats the debt management agency employs over 650 people who annually process 5 million different accounts. It is hoped by the organisers of CCR-Interactive that the company’s involvement will provide them with two things, firstly the means to host such an important event, but also the prestige of Wescot will no doubt attract even more people to attend CCR-Interactive.

At the event, attendees can expect amongst other things a brilliant opportunity to socialise and network. The CCR-Interactive attracts many different businesses and some of which would not ordinarily correspond in such a neutral and positive environment. Indwescotividuals, not affiliated with a company will enjoy being able to approach many different businesses in one go, getting a frank view of what each company could offer them.

To end the day, CCR and their sponsor will host a dinner and awards ceremony. The CCR awards are some of the highest accolades that any company in the credit industry can hope to achieve and they are attended by hundreds of people. This is the perfect place for a customer driven company like Wescot to showcase their capabilities as a sponsor and highlight the company’s strengths in general.

Wescot | Money Advice Scotland Introduces New Sponsor for their Conference

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Money Advice Scotland is a charity that has been operating since 1989; they provide important advice to people struggling to repay debts and attempting to relieve the burden that borrowing money often creates. Each year, Money Advice Scotland hosts a two day conference to bring together people from all over the credit industry, not just major lenders but also individuals that need advice on financial responsibility and debt management companies. The event has continued to go from strength to strength as it provides not onlywescot a forum for those who are in debt to voice their worries and receive advice on where to go next, but it also attracts many large companies wishing to network and meet other companies within the industry. Naturally, an event such as this requires a certain level of financial support, and Money Advice Scotland sources many sponsors, including large lending companies. They have recently announced Wescot, a debt recovery company from Glasgow as one of the big new sponsors of the event.

As well as the necessary financial backing required to host such an event, Money Advice Scotland also welcomed the prestige that their big sponsors bring with them. Their newest sponsor, Wescot for example employs 650 people over three locations, Glasgow, Saltcoats and Hull and they process 5 million accounts each year. They have become one of the biggest debt recovery companies in the country and as such they are bound to attract even more people to attend the Money Advice Scotland conference in the years to come. Not only will their prestige attract other companies, start-ups and established lenders that require debt recoveries, but the attraction of having a market expert to provide advice to people suffering from debt will be a large boon to the conference.

The event itself covers two days, on the first day there are optional workshops that will focus on different but related areas of credit management. These workshops are held primarily for members of the public that Money Advice Scotland come into contact with every day as part of their operations. One of the biggest attractions of these events for corporations, however are the ample opportunities to network with other businesses in the industry that they might not otherwise come into contact with.

Wescot | Experian’s ExPin Service Receives New Client

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Experian is one of the largest credit management companies in the world, they are most famous for leading the way in providing rapid results on credit history checks, ensuring that lenders know exactly who they are about to hand a loan over to. While Experian is based in Dublin, they have operational centres in Nottingham, Sao Paulo and in California and they employ a total of 17000 people. Their job is to compile all the data on purchases, income and outgoings on individuals so that when that individual next goes to apply for credit, they can quickly give the lender an assessment on whether they can afford it or not. ExPin is the name of the new system that Experian have developed to further assist third parties in lending.

ExPin’s focus is on the customers of Experian’s clientele. The system compiles data from Experian’s already considerably database and then delivers this information directly to the client. Each ExPin client is given a bespoke service that matches the customers that they might come into contact with, it constantly updates itself so wescotthat the information is always current and relevant to the transaction they are about to make. The quantitative assessment that ExPin will make for clients will take a lot of the hassle out of making a credit assessment themselves, and clients can have confidence in the accuracy of the results that the system provides.

Recently, as part of a multimillion pound deal, Experian have teamed up with Wescot, a debt recovery agency from Glasgow, to allow them to use the ExPin system. This move is set to rapidly speed up the process with which they can recover debts. There are a certain amount of pressures on debt recovery agencies to act within stricter guidelines as per the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) as well as the limited funds available to most people as a result of the global financial crisis. By utilising the ExPin system, Wescot are now able to rapidly make an assessment on just how much the customers can pay by looking at how much money they spend each month.

The speed at which ExPin can now deliver results to the clients of Experian has helped to ensure the credit management company’s success in the future as well as helping thousands of clients make credit decisions across the world.

Wescot | Debt Recovery Improved by New Letters Management

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While there is a large portion of business correspondence now conducted through emails, there is still a necessity for businesses to send out large volumes of traditional post, often Wescothe only option is to send letters out. There is a company that can assist in what can be such a time consuming and expensive exercise, Adare Limited specialise in cost effective large volume mail solutions. Adare place special emphasis on transactional mail, security print and direct mail operations and adhere consistently with the laws of the Data Protection Act, ensuring both their clients and recipients of the mail are protected. With an on-site production facility, Adare are also able to offer cheaper alternatives than their peers and a much faster mail service.

In keeping with Adare’s philosophy of speeding up large volume mail processes, they have also developed a software programme called SmartEdit. This enables clients to alter many letters far quicker than a traditional word processing suite, particularly when the letter contains stock information but there are minor alterations required such as address and name of recipient. By using SmartEdit, clients can quickly process large amounts of mail without having to go through each document individually and manually change the minor details. What this translates to in terms of Adare’s clients is primarily a much faster mailing system and a reduced cost for the business.

Wescot is a debt recovery company employing 650 people, with offices in the main HQ of Glasgow, Saltcoats and Hull. They regularly process 5 million accounts each year and as is the nature of their business, emails are often ignored. Therefore, Wescot need a fast and cost effective method that will deliver as many physical letters as possible, to this end the debt recovery agency turned to Adare Limited to service their mail. They also implement Adare’s SmartEdit system, because the letters they send out are often the same, apart from a change in name and the amount that they need to pay back to the client. Without Adare’s mail management and software, Wescot would take a lot longer to process each account and ultimately, not be as profitable as they are.

Adare Limited are a customer focused company that are committed to reducing the costs of large volume mail operations and speeding up the process of delivering hundreds of letters at once.

Wescot | Efficient Complaints Process for Debt Recovery

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WescotFor many large companies, it is important that they should attempt to speed up the efficiency of all the processes that enable the business to keep running. This goes for not just the primary systems that make up the initial business model, be that credit lending or selling watches, but the background processes that are necessary for any business to work, departments such as human resources have to be as efficient as possible reduce costs for the business as a whole. The Equinti group specialises in improving these systems through the use of IT programmes and software. One of the more common products that Equinti offer is called Perito and the Perito system is used extensively in automating many processes and actively reducing the costs for Equinti’s clients.

One of Equinti’s current clients is a credit management company from Glasgow. Wescot is one of the UK’s largest debt recovery companies, employing over 650 people in three locations throughout the North. Because the debt recovery industry has recently been put under increased pressure from the new regulatory body, the Financial Conduct Authority, companies have had to greatly improve their customer relations and complaint management systems. Perito is one such automated system that has been shown to reduce the ‘risk associated with manual processes’, so says a spokesperson for the debt recovery company. Wescot is now in a position whereby they can much more efficiently deal with complaints from third parties by utilising the Perito system. Each mistake that is left absent by implementing Perito is a mistake that will no longer affect the running of the business. The programme works by sorting the complaints into a database with each one ranked in severity. This means that the more imperative complaints will be dealt with quicker, in accordance with the FCA regulations.

Equinti have worked closely with large IT companies, Microsoft and IBM in order to create their automated IT systems. With the backing and support of these companies, clients of Equinti can rest assured that the most efficient and best quality programmes are in their hands, actively contributing to both a more efficient and cost effective business. For Equinti, their philosophy is the continued reduction in unnecessary costs and this can be seen through the software programmes that they develop.

Wescot | Learning Objectives that Focus on Customer Service

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There is a changing environment within the debt recovery industry, there is the obvious pressure that given the current economic climate, people have less and less money to spend. For debt recovery companies such as Wescot, this means that it takes relatively more time to recover debt for a client as customers are slower to repay. Factor in to this the fact that the industry has been placed under new guidelines from the Financial Conduct Authority who are demanding stricter rules for complaints management amongst other things, then Wescot and other debt recovery agencies have had to redevelop their operating procedures. This ultimately will result in retraining current staff and altering the training that new staff receive when they join Wescot.

Wescot are one of the largest debt recovery companies in the UK, with 650 employees who work in one of three locations, either Glasgow, Hull or Saltcoats in Western Scotland. Together the company processes 5 million individual debts and in order to change the running of a business as large as Wescot, their learning and development department has had to work hard in order to fall in line with the new regulations. One of the most important things that Wescot’s learning and development team has had to do is notify current and future clients of what the debt recovery company can actually achieve under the new laws. This has required the retraining of staff at Wescot, to uphold the company policy of focussing on the customers and clients of the company.

wescotThe learning and development team at Wescot have many combined years of experience in training employees. Mike Rustill alone has had twenty years in the business, including leading the training department at mobile phone giants, O2 and he brings his expertise and high skill level within learning and development. He has a proven track record at previous roles, not just at Wescot, at being able to perform at a senior operating level. In addition to Mike Rustill, the learning and development team of Wescot also contains Elaine MacDonald, a woman who has seven years in the financial industry, and after joining Wescot in 2003 as a collections agent, Elaine has been promoting to a senior role in the department. These are just a couple of examples of the highly skilled people that operate the learning and development team at Wescot, proving to customers that the training will in fact be effective in updating Wescot’s workforce.

Wescot | Debt Recovery Agency Implements Successful Learning and Development

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Training and continued development of employees is one of the key aspects to running a successful business, training encourages two things, first of which is that it makes employees feel more valued by their employer. Secondly, because employees feel more engaged, they are then more likely to commit greater effort to the business buoyed by the recent development. Wescot is a debt wescotrecovery agency from the UK, that have recognised the need for continued development of their staff, not least because of the extraneous pressures placed on the company to update its processes.

While Wescot have already employed a successful team within the learning and development department, to further train their employees in responsible debt recovery and customer relations, they have had to recently update their operating procedures. This has involved changing the training that Wescot staff receive to fall in line with the new laws set out by the Financial Conduct Authority.

Wescot is one of the largest debt recovery companies in the UK, 5 million individual debts are processed through the company’s 650 employees. Because of the high level of operation that Wescot currently performs at, it is important that the company not only retains a high level of training, but they ensure that the training they give to employees will allow them to work with the FCA’s permission. In a large company such as Wescot, it would be easy for employees to slip under the radar and not receive further training. Such is the high quality of the learning and development department at Wescot that this is not the case, it is important for the continued success of the company that their employees feel motivated and engaged enough to do their jobs to the required standard.

In order to cover all the bases, Wescot continually review their agents and their performances are assessed. The learning and development department will then look at the areas that the employees need to work on and develop the training programmes to suit. In addition to helping engage their employees, Wescot are transparent when it comes to what the management team expect of their colleagues when they turn up to work. The management team also take an active role in developing those who are underperforming, being an integral part in Wescot’s learning and development systems

Wescot Credit Services – Proud Sponsors

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For more than 40 years, Wescot have been providing vital products and services in the industry of receivables management in the UK and now find themselves at the very top of their field. They were set-up as a partnership originally in the 1970s, but became a private limited company in 1983 and Wescot Credit Services Ltd came to exist.

Local government, utilities, retail finance services telecoms and media and banking and finance are all sectors that Wescot provide services to clients in. More than 50 of the country’s best recognised and most successful companies, including Sky, HSBC, RBS and British Gas to name but a few, are currently benefitting from the range of products and services that Wescot Credit Services Ltd offer.

Proud sponsors of this year’s CCR-Interactive and Credit Excellence Awards, Wescot are further raising their profile within the industry and the event’s organisers believe that their support will add real kudos to the day. Wescot are not strangers to sponsoring such prestigious events however, as their annual involvement with the Money Advice Scotland Annual Conference shows.

The fact that Wescot Credit Services Ltd have no debts means they find themselves in a strong trading position. The £32 million turnover they generated in the year ending February 2012 is proof of their financial stability and sees them in an excellent position to best support their customers. This is because they are able to exceed their clients’ ongoing requirements with the sufficient capital they possess. In the last 2 years, Wescot have undertaken a significant investment programme and upgraded much of their information technology infrastructure. This allows them to provide an even better service to their clients and they now have the potential to upscale their current size by three times.

Their people are another aspect of their business that Wescot look to invest in. Their comprehensive learning and development programme means that employees are given a bespoke development plan, which looks to enhance their skills and improve career progression opporwescottunities. One example of Wescot Credit Services Ltd’s commitment to their employees can be seen in their ‘time off work for study’ policy. This allows individuals to request time off from their working week to undertake study activities relating to courses relevant to their jobs. The company’s clients ultimately benefits too, as the people they are liaising with at Wescot are skilled and motivated, which allows them to provide the best possible service.

Wescot Credit Services – Swift Advances

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Wescot Credit Services Ltd are able to provide first class solutions for their clients and often exceed all expectations. A great example of this was the project twescothey carried out for Swift Advances to locate a number of the company’s former customers. Swift had given Wescot the task of tracing more than 2,000 customers who had already paid off their loans and were due to receive a small refund. The conclusion of the exercise saw the successful location of nearly 80% of the individuals concerned, which far exceeded the expectation that Swift Advances had at the start of the project. ‘Locate’ is just one of the many core services that Wescot Credit Services Ltd provide for their clients.

The early 1970s is when Wescot first came on the scene as a debt collections solutions provider. Initially a partnership, the firm was developed into a private limited company in 1983 and the Wescot Credit Services Ltd that is known today was formed. At present, they provide services for a broad range of clients across a number of various sectors. At any one time, they are managing over £4.5 billion worth of performing assets on behalf of their clients and in the year ending February 2013, they dealt with more than 3 million customer accounts. The result of these dealings was the return of over £240 million to the balance sheets of their clients. This is just one of the many reasons why Wescot find themselves as the leading provider of receivables management services in the UK.

To further enhance their reputation and brand awareness, Wescot Credit Services Ltd will be the main sponsors at this year’s CCR-Interactive and Credit Excellence Awards. This is a highly respected event in the industry calendar and its agenda always brings together high calibre speakers and delegates. This is just one reason why Wescot are happy to associate their name with the conference.

Experian are a global information services company who provide clear and accurate data to other businesses and individuals. Wescot Credit Services Ltd signed a deal with Experian two years ago which enabled them to benefit from this vast provision of information. This allows them to gain a better understanding of their customers’ situations and tailor services to suit their needs. It also means that Wescot are in a better position to adhere to the strict regulatory guidelines in the industry and as a result all their customers get treated fairly.

Wescot Credit Services – Experian

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Wescot Credit Services Ltd have been providing a range of receivables management services and products for over 40 years. They were originally set-up under the name Wescot, but in 1983 they were incorporated into a private limited company and the business that is known today began to exist. At present, they provide services for a broad range of clients, across a number of different sectors, including telecoms and media, utilities, retail finance services and banking and finance. Some of the large firms who employ their services include SKY, NPower, HSBC, Barclays and RBS.

Wescot’s prominent status can be seen in the fact they are acting as the main sponsor for this year’s CCR-Interactive and Credit Excellence Awards. This is a great opportunity for Wescot Credit Services Ltd to enhance their reputation and being associated with such a prestigious event in their industry will undoubtedly have a positive effect on their business. The organisers of the event have stated that Wescot’s influence will bring extra kudos to the day.

Customers who are dealt with by Wescot on behalf of their clients can expect to receive an excellent and more importantly fair service from the company. Wescot have to adhere to strict industry guidelines, which are in place to regulate their dealings with customers. A deal that Wescot struck with Experian two years ago means they are in a much better position to understand their customers’ situations and circumstances. This is because they have access to vast amounts of accurate and clear data from Experian to assist them with their work. This allows them to tailor their services to better suit the needs of the customer and a fairer approach is adopted to the collection of debts.

wescotWescot Credit Services Ltd are specialists at what they do and often exceed the expectations of their clients. One example of this can be seen in a project they carried out for Swift Advances. The goal was to locate more than 2,000 previous Swift customers who had already repaid their loans. The individuals involved were due to receive a small refund and therefore Swift wanted to track them down. Wescot, using their core range of ‘locate’ products and services, were able to successfully trace almost 80% of the past Swift customers. This far exceeded the expectations of Swift, who concluded the exercise as successful.