Most of my regular readers will know that I have a bee in my bonnet about factoring awards. It’s not the concept of industry awards themselves that I object to but the fact that they tend to be awarded to the most inappropriate factoring companies with many awards being won by the company who can drum up more people to vote for them than any others.
My main complaint is that factoring companies can stick logos on their marketing material claiming to be award winners which will often fool people into thinking that the company in question is genuinely the best in it’s field when frequently they are anything but.
The most recent awards short list to come across my desk was the Insolvency and Rescue awards and the short list for Asset and Invoice Finance Provider of the Year was as follows:-
Gener8 Finance
Hitachi Capital Business Finance
MyInvoiceFinance
Secure Trust Bank Commercial Finance
I have seen some unusual shortlists in my time but the above just about takes the biscuit.
Gener8 Finance is a company that I refuse to deal for reasons that I won’t go into in public.
Hitachi Capital Business Finance is a factoring company that has a good reputation for service levels but I didn’t think that they had much of an appetite for companies with a chequered financial history such as those that may be generated by the insolvency and rescue profession.
Myinvoicefinance is known as a small broking outfit although they may fund the odd client or two themselves and finally
Secure Trust Bank Commercial Finance which has only been trading for a few months.
A few of my factoring buddies attended the prize giving dinner and I am reliably informed that when the winner was announced it was met by a good deal of sniggering from many of the tables who wondered whether their good fortune had anything to do with the fact that they were sponsoring some of the other awards.
To save me starting another blog post on the same subject I recently received an email from Wealth & Financial International telling me that “after months of voting, research and hard choices they had finally decided on the worthy winners of this year’s awards, celebrating the service, skill and dedication of individuals and firms across a multitude of financial disciplines and sizes; from local heroes to national treasures, from single-office firms to international juggernauts, we celebrate them all.
I am pleased to announce that Factoring Solutions has been awarded “Recognised Leader in Specialised Factoring Brokerage – UK and now I will proudly adorn this great honour on my website but no sniggering please 😀
The NACFB awards dinner was held last night and the Factor & Discounter of the year was awarded to Bibby yet again.
Amongst the plethora of meaningless awards this is perhaps the only one that has any merit in it as the award is voted for by a large number of commercial finance brokers who I assume have some knowledge of factoring and therefore have a rough idea of whom would make a worthy recipient