Making it easy to collect on debt

A financial software company, which helps banks collect on their consumer debt, has listed on the Bermuda Stock Exchange.

Apollo Enterprise Solutions is also listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and plans to apply for a listing on the SIX Swiss exchange. 

Joseph Konowiecki, CEO of Apollo Enterprise Solutions, told the Bermuda Sun, no bank in Bermuda is using its system, but the largest retail bank in the UK, Lloyd’s Banking Group is.

Mr Konowiecki said: “One of the top three US banks is also licencing the software. We’re expanding to at least three other large UK banks in the near future and we’re talking to many banks on the continent.”

Bank of Scotland

Both the Bank of Scotland and Halifax Bank are having it installed. 

The AES True System applies the bank’s digitized business rules to the bank’s credit portfolio data, and combines them with outside information such as credit bureau reports to formulate highly-targeted debt settlement offers directly to delinquent consumers.  

Mr Konowiecki added this increases collections, enables replacement of manual systems, and reduces administration and staffing which can produce $50M in additional margin on a $10B consumer debt loan portfolio.

He said : “For those people who are going online, we are having a positive financial action — either in making a payment or making a promise to pay of over 70 per cent. We don’t know if it will sustain itself at that level for the future, but we are very satisfied with the initial results with this large institution.

“We feel that 80 per cent of all people in arrears want to pay. They just need the tools in order to do it and that’s what our system does.”

Quicker

He said the system emulate a live agent but allows customers to take action sooner, which means banks or other financial institutions are able to save money and get what is owed quicker.”

He said Apollo decided to list on the BSX because “Bermuda is very business-friendly” but has good regulation.

Supporting

“It allows us to do a dual listing with the Frankfurt Stock Exchange because Bermuda is well-respected by other exchanges throughout the world.

“The BSX has been a very good partner in supporting us in our endeavours.”

Mr Konowiecki said the current version of the banking software has been available for the past 30 months. 

He added even though it is being used by large institutions like Lloyd’s and Bank of America, smaller ones can achieve a cost savings as well.