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.
The 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.
Another indicator of the success of Wescot and the solid reputation the company enjoys can be found in the fact that this year it was involved in a sponsorship capacity in two of the most prestigious annual events in the credit industry calendar. Wescot was the main sponsor of the 2013 CCR Interactive event and the Credit Excellence Awards. The purpose of this annual event is to spread the latest best practice principles across the industry. It is also a very useful forum for debate concerning the challenges faced by the credit industry now and in the near future.
Wescot also has a highly effective locate team. Swift Cover, one of the country’s leading insurers, recently selected Wescot to complete a specialist-tracing project on its behalf. Swift was legally required to make small repayments to a large number of former customers. As part of this, approximately 2000 customers had to be traced. Because this was outside of the usual type of activities Swift is engaged in, the insurer did not have the resources or the expertise to carry out the tracing project itself. Swift chose Wescot as its partner. The choice was warranted. The Wescot locate team was able to track down 80 per cent of the individuals Swift was attempting to trace. This exceeded the insurer’s expectations.
It is extremely fitting that Wescot was the principal sponsor of this year’s event. Since its conception in Scotland over 30 years ago, Wescot has gradually grown from strength to strength. The company now has nationwide coverage and employs over 650 employees at offices in Glasgow, Saltcoats and Hull. It has expertise across a number of distinct areas including debt recovery, early stage collections, customer tracing and debt purchase.
The Wescot website is also geared towards providing customers with all possible assistance. It includes a facility enabling customers to make a payment online. Alternatively, customers have the option of making payments by telephone. Other methods of payment include Direct Debit payments, PayPoint outlet payment or else payment by cheque. The website also provides a comprehensive questions and answers page. It sets out very clearly the options open to the customer for discussing and negotiating payment.