At the start of the week I hosted and chaired the latest ICM Think Tank. It was our most well attended to date, with some 25 senior representatives from all parts of the credit industry coming together to share their thoughts and views and join in a lively debate around the key issues of the day.
Among the delegates was Mike Chambers, Managing Director of Bacs, and it was most interesting to hear his views around the proposed withdrawal of cheques by 2018. The next two years, it would seem, will tell us a great deal about the preparedness of the banks, businesses and the consumer in migrating to alternative payment methods.
The issue of late payment was also discussed, particularly in light of new EU legislation that I commented on in an earlier blog, but perhaps the main topic of discussion was around the provision of data, and specifically the provision of debtors' payment data as a prerequisite for future adequate and meaningful risk assessment. It is inherent within our business culture, it would appear, to jealously guard what financial data we possess, even if in sharing that data we might all ultimately benefit.
The Think Tank also provided the forum for discussing the preliminary findings of our new Credit Managers' Index (CMI). Although it is still very early days, there are some interesting trends emerging, and work is now underway in preparing for the next survey in December to enable the first comparisions - and therefore the first 'index' - to be drawn.
In what has been a busy week, I was delighted to have been actively engaged in CCR-i which seemed to be the most successful yet. Our commitment as the ICM is to further build CCR-i to become the foremost national event for the credit industry, and it was most encouraging to see so many credit professionals - and ICM Members in particular - taking time out of their busy schedules to attend.
On the day, I chaired the Commercial Credit Strategy stream with various presentations from credit professionals sharing their own 'front-line' experience as opposed to theory. It gave delegates much food for thought in terms of reinforcing their own current practices and/or learning of new techniques to deploy.
Sharing with credit professionals from across the industry, and a range of sectors, with different perspectives gave those present a real sense of the power of belonging to - and engaging with - the wider community through organisations like the ICM http://www.icm.org.uk.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment