I am in a bit of a quandary due to a recent takeover in the factoring industry. I am happy to admit that Calverton Finance was one of my favourite factoring companies for certain types of client as their service levels were second to none and I had a lot of faith in the senior management team for the way that they went about running a factoring company. With very few exceptions clients that they took on tended to stay with them.
The Managing Director retired a year ago and the Sales Director left shortly thereafter which was a shame as they were both ethical, capable people that I had a lot of time for.
Rumours had been circling around the industry for a while that they were for sale but it was a bit of a shock to me to hear that the company that ended up buying them was the parent company of Pulse Factoring Solutions Ltd which is a factoring company that I have always adamantly refused to deal with
Pulse started life run by two ex directors of the late unlamented Aston Rothbury Factors which went bust in 2013 and for many years it had the reputation of being the lender of last resort with many of their factoring clients not lasting very long.
“Pulse” wasn’t an easy company to follow the fortunes of as there seemed to be quite a few companies bearing the Pulse name some of which didn’t last long before being dissolved and most changing their names at least once.
Most of the independent factoring companies are funded by back to back arrangements with banks but Pulse’s financing didn’t seem to be quite so easy to follow until three years ago when it’s financing was taken over by a company in the group that later acquired them.
Pulse Factoring Solutions Ltd is now part of the Cubitt Trade Holdings LLC group which itself is directly wholly-owned by PETRA Group Holdings Limited, a Cayman Islands limited liability company. PETRA Group Holdings Limited is wholly-owned by BlueCompass Management Partners LP, a Cayman Islands limited partnership.
Now you can see my quandary. One of my favourite factoring companies that looks after a number of my clients now tied up with a factoring company that has always been at the top of my dislike list.
Hopefully Calverton will be left to continue under it’s existing management and more importantly with it’s existing business philosophy but I will be keeping a very close eye on my clients there. One of the reasons that factoring companies like dealing with me is that unlike many of my broker competitors I don’t churn my clients on an annual basis in search of greater commissions for myself but if I find that the service levels are decreasing I will have no hesitation in moving my clients onwards and upwards.
I received an email this morning telling me that Calverton Finance were changing their name to Pulse Cashflow Finance (MK) Ltd and I must admit that I was absolutely astounded at the stupidity of whoever made that decision.
As I mentioned in my blog Calverton were one of my favourite factoring companies with service levels second to none proved by their very high client retention rate.
Pulse by contrast at one time had a reputation of being the factoring company of last resort where companies went that other factors wouldn’t touch. They charged very high fee levels and had a far higher attrition rate than the norm.
To be honest I have no idea if they have changed but they do say that leopards don’t change their spots which is why I was stunned at the marketing decision to tar Calverton with the same brush by changing their name.
I was having a look at the parent company and it’s associates all of whom end up in the Cayman Islands so no-one really knows who they are and how much they are worth but it is worth noting that there are discrepancies in the share capital of the parent accounts which at the very least shows a lack of professionalism