Asset finance companies must adapt as Coronavirus changes customer behaviour

Asset finance providers need to reconsider the way they communicate to customers, the methods they use and how they apply categorisation, including the definition of vulnerability, to ensure they are meeting clients’ needs in the ‘new normal’.

Joel Bailey, director, EY Seren, said: “The conversations we have been having with our clients, who all have customer segmentations on which to base data-driven decisions, is that they all need to be modified to respond to this ‘new normal’ situation.

“How do these changes manifest across their population? And what are the treatment strategies? Identify the new interventions that enable you to properly interact, using the right behavioural psychology to prompt the right action.

“It does demand a greater degree of sophistication; if it was hard before, it has got even harder. Sophistication around good data analytics, good customer research and understanding, with interventions at the right point, is the way through this.”

The event also heard from Will Shaw, the consultancy’s principal service designer, who argued that business definitions of vulnerable customers have to change.

“There is no such thing as a vulnerable customer,” he said. “There are only customers who are in vulnerable situations. So, it is simply not the case that vulnerability is in the essence of someone’s being and you can identify it.

“Vulnerable is a shifting spectrum. It is a shifting state that we’re all dipping in and out of.”

The seminar heard how psychology can be used to better understand customers and respond to their changing needs.

Maria Fafouti, senior service designer at EY Seren, said: “It is no longer enough just sending a letter saying ‘you owe X amount of money’, there has to be more support offered to give customers emotional empowerment.

“We need to be using information to empower us and become much more emotionally sensitive when reaching out to these customers.”

Chris Tobey, global sales director – wholesale finance solutions, at NETSOL Technologies highlighted that technology has played a key role in supporting customers through the pandemic.

He explained: “Initially, the shift was to make existing systems work through the crisis. Those companies who had invested in digital customer journeys have gained considerable advantage over those who have not, and they can now use it to gain loyalty from existing customers and to win new customers.

“NETSOL Technologies worked with clients to help them manage the immediate challenges, including setting up remote working and establishing systems to process applications for government loans and forbearance.

“Other initiatives have included development of automated systems to reduce manual checking during the decision-making process and delivering new real-time insights on finance customers as historic credit data is less reliable.

“Everyone seems to accept that the effect of the crisis is to accelerate digitalisation. The aim is to develop increasingly tailored customer journeys that meet their customers’ individual needs; this can be a differentiator which increases loyalty and wins more business.”

You can download the minutes from the IAFN Online event using the form below.

To access future events or watch previous online seminars, register for IAFN Online membership at www.iafnonline.com 

{loadposition iafnsession10minutes}