DCASA Meeting – Report

DCASA Regional Meeting – W Cape

The Debt Counsellors Association of South Africa recently held a meeting in the Western Cape (Parow, Cape Town). Member Debt Counsellors as well as guests (incl Credit Providers and other Debt Counsellors) attended. The day started at a civilized time (it is Cape Town after all) and the event was very well supported. Breakfast and lunch were courtesy of Hyphen PDA who also made a presentation during the day. The chairperson for the day was local DCASA Regional Chairperson Reinhardt Pettenberger.

The Presentations

The first speaker was Eugene Cillier of PayPlan Solutions (the local DCASA NEC representative). Eugene mentioned some of the planned events at the upcoming DCASA conference. He then gave feed back on the recent DC questionnaire which was sent out regarding several credit providers incl ABSA, Edcon and Iemas. Apparently there was good feed back from the industry. of the 260 responses a third were from non members. Recently DCASA met with Edcon at the NCR’s offices to discuss matters relating to debt review. After Edcon then sharing their escalation process (current details) at least two members report improved responses to issues at the creditor. ABSA have also been meeting with various industry role players across the country including DCASA. Eugene reported that a 4 hour meeting was held with the bank.  Eugene then moved on to CIF matters including DCRS, the PDA fee and timing reductions under the amendments, Section 103(5) and end balance differences. The audience then raised the issue of the delays at the National Credit Tribunal. One Debt Counsellor reported a delay with over 200 of his matters at the NCT. The NCR mentioned that they will soon (Sept?) be engaging with the NCT in this regard.

Event Sponsor

A presentation by Chris of Hyphen PDA focused in on the viability and profitability of debt counselling practices. He said that of every 6 DC firms he has seen only 1 has grown and remained profitable. He pointed to various factors that affect growth and profitability including the business mode, sale and operations processes, IT and systems integration and training of staff. In 2013 – 2014 Hyphen saw an industry wide growth of 30% (meaning more consumers were signing up for help). In 2014 – present (2015) they have seen a further 35% growth in the industry. He asked Debt Counsellors attending to consider if their businesses had grown by a similar margin? Chris said:” your business success effects whether you will be able to continue to help consumers”. He urged Debt Counsellors to know their figures and keep on growing their business. He also mentioned several new features offered by the integrated software Debt Counsellors use to link to Hyphen PDA to help distribute funds for consumers.

Credit Provider

Next on the roster was Capitec Bank Debt Review Centre who gave not one but two audio visual presentations. They discussed how they cover the cost of credit life insurance for their clients accounts themselves.They also pointed out how they implement changes and proposals directly onto the main Capitec banking system (through their own internal debt review system) right away when accepting proposals.

The Regulator

The NCR (Peter) made a presentation and discussed matters relating to CIF and some current industry issues. One topic that came up was what type of training was required for call centre staff. It was mentioned that the NCR would like to see all such staff receive the “normal” training (a reference perhaps to the NCA training course for Debt Counsellors). It was stated that as long as the Debt Counsellor themselves got the “go ahead” from consumers over the phone that this would be sufficient to constitute acceptance (rather than physical signing of a Form 16) of the process. That said, the call would have to be recorded and all information, as normally captured on a form 16, captured and explained. Then there was a discussion of the Van Der Hoooven ruling and how this has streamlined debt review in most courts in the north of the country.

Nom, Nom, Yack, Yack

Debt Counsellors from the Western Cape relaxing, chatting and snacking at the regional DCASA meeting.