#stepchange

Working together to meet the demand for debt advice

A partnership approach is what will ultimately help us make inroads into the nation’s debt problems. How do we work with our partners in practice?By Vikki Brownridge, Director of Charity DevelopmentPhil Andrew, StepChange CEO speaking at Stepping Forward: TogetherWe’re enormously grateful for the funding that many partners provide which supports and underpins our ability to operate, and in turn helps hundreds of thousands of people to deal with their problem debt.One of the things we do is to make sure that our creditor and funding partners are involved in our development, and last week we held an event in Leeds to talk about our strategic direction, kick-off a 3 month consultation with them and to discuss some of our current and forthcoming ways of working projects.This reflects the collaborative approach we want to adopt, both with our partners and the wider sector, but also the need to recognise the pressing underlying scale of demand for debt advice. Addressing the market demand vs supply issue cannot be done in isolation, it will require a significant collective effort. These means we must all step up, together.Stepping Forward: TogetherThe event, ‘Stepping forward together: Gearing up for growth’, marks the start of a three-month consultation period with our partners to work together to help even more people struggling with problem debt.Our CEO Phil Andrew kicked off the day with an update on our four-year strategy, an overview of the funding issues facing the sector, and why we needed to transform the way we work, to maximise effectiveness and to add value to our clients and our funders.“ As a full service debt advice charity, giving people financial advice and getting them through debt advice where appropriate, we helped more people than ever before in 2018 — helping over 650,000 people, and completing over 306,000 debt advice sessions. It is deeply disturbing that we’re servicing such a high percentage of the UK population.”Caroline Siarkiewicz, Acting Chief Executive of the Money and Pensions Service (MaPS) led the next session, talking us through their vision, strategic goals and insights into the current debt advice landscape.Our transformational journeyAndrew Burgess, Head of Client Journey talking us through transformationAndrew Burgess, our Head of Client Journey, talked us through the process we’ve been on to transform our ways of working and development of our new debt advice and customer management system. As he explained:“Growth comes at a cost… Our decision to take a strategic review of change was not about a system upgrade, or even a process change — it was a change to our basic ways of working. We were clear from the outset that we wanted to put users at the heart of this change. That means change to the advice system, how we interact with clients, the way our teams are structured, and the types of work we do, as well as how we measure success.”Kicking off the partner consultationThe afternoon session featured collaborative working groups.During the working groups there was plenty of lively discussion, with representatives from around the charity hosting the groups discussing questions like:How can creditors refer people beginning to experience financial difficulty but before they’re in problem debt?What initiatives could we work on together to underpin responsible credit use?How can we work together on persistent credit card debt to get customers to take action?What kinds of technology might usefully help us to best deliver debt advice to vulnerable clients?A huge thank you to the representatives of all our partner organisations who attended the event and engaged so enthusiastically in the discussion groups. Your support and suggestions are incredibly valuable to us and will help us continue to work towards reducing the harm of problem debt, deliver high-quality advice and early intervention services to all people who need them.In November we’ll be hosting a follow-up event in central London where we’ll share our consultation findings and reflect on what they mean for the charity.In the meantime, we want to hear views from all of our partners. You can have your say and take part in the consultation by emailing your comments or suggestions to our consultation inbox.Vikki Brownridge is Director of Charity Development at StepChange Debt Charity.

StepChange Debt Charity Response to Farnish Review

Debt management charity StepChange have released a response to the review of the Money Advice Service by Christine Farnish.

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Commercial Domestic Investigations worked hard this week to help support a charity drive to help people suffering with debt problems. Debt Charity StepChange ran its second Debt Awareness Week campaign, which is designed to highlight the problems of those suffering with unmanageable debt.

As an industry leading debt collection agency we’re well aware of the debt problems in the UK. Our debt collection services are renowned throughout the industry and our debt collection experts are used to speaking to people on a daily basis who are suffering with debt issues.

Debt Collection

Debt Collectors develop good instincts when it comes to collecting debts. Our trained advisors are usually able to quickly identify the difference between someone who can’t pay, and someone who is just trying to dodge a debt. The question remains, when someone is really suffering with genuine financial issues, what can a debt collection agency do to help the person, and by extension our client?

StepChange offer debt advice that is fee free and genuinely impartial and independent. Debt Management Plans are offered free of charge by StepChange so that all of the money paid into the plan goes towards the debts the person owes, rather than having fees taken from the money paid in. This is good for the person in debt and ideal for the creditor.

Budgeting

Many people we speak to in regards to collecting debts have issues with budgeting. They’ve often never put a budget together before and this can be an educating experience for many. Our advisors are well versed in helping debtors put together a realistic and sustainable budget. StepChange assist us with this by providing budgeting guidelines which are widely used throughout the industry and are seen as a fair standard.

Debt Awareness Week which is run annually helps to shine a national light on the debt problems many are suffering within the UK. This helps debt collection agencies like ourselves see the scale of the issue which many of our clients, who are business owners, are also suffering with.

Debt affects business cash flow

Business owners suffering from bad debt can look at the figures supplied by StepChange and see that it’s not just small and medium sized businesses who are owed money. Much of the debt reported by StepChange is consumer debt owed to banks, or on credit cards and personal loans.

If someone owes your business money and is struggling to pay, what’s the best and most ethical way of the collecting the debt? Commercial Domestic Investigations always follow best practice when we collect debts, and we support and encourage charities like StepChange and other organisations that offer free and impartial debt advice. As debt collection experts we understand the scale of the problem.

ABOUT COMMERCIAL & DOMESTIC INVESTIGATIONS

Commercial & Domestic Investigations are regarded within the debt collection and credit control industry as one of the best credit management companies in the UK. Established in 1988 to support and service all sizes of companies in the field of Credit Management. Primarily our clients use our automated Debt Collection Services, but over the last eighteen years clients requirements have changed dramatically, something Commercial & Domestic Investigations has addressed. We now boast a national client base in excess of 30,000 companies. Commercial & Domestic Investigations has grown by listening to clients’ requirements and adapting our services to meet all companies’ needs from Sole Traders, SMES, Ltd and Plcs. Please contact us on 08444 159200 for more information.