Head: Collections and Recoveries Strategy – Card & Transactional at Absa Group Limited (Absa)

Job Description

Strategy, Planning and Risk Management

• Lead the adoption of leading-edge customer collection strategies in Card and Transactional, including pre-collections (high-risk account management), pre-legal, legal, and off-balance sheet.
• Develop and / or optimize collections and high-risk account management strategies (preventing a customer rolling into collections) using leading-edge techniques / scoring to maximize collections, including the ownership of implementation of the strategies (Example TRIAD, Collections Scorecards).
• To lead the debt sale strategy of the Everyday Banking business and manage the debt sale process end-to-end.
• Expand on post write-off recovery strategies in an attempt to optimize this cashflow stream
• Participate in the strategy setting and design of the Collections Operations and External Debt Collectors incentive programmes to ensure their effectiveness in motivating collectors and ensuring performance is improved to attain budgeted targets.
• Maintain documentation of end‐to‐end credit collections strategy.
• Understand the interaction between the macro environment and credit performance and adjust credit collections strategies to accommodate stressed events – based on macro expectations.
• Contribute to development of short and medium term financial and business plans driven by business by providing advisory input on the acceptable risk/reward profile while supporting efforts to maximize the opportunities.
• Develop strategy and policy tests to challenge and enhance current strategies.
• Ensure Management Information (MI) in place or is developed to monitor strategy performance and effective implementation/adherence by quality checking MI teams reports and reviewing the information the relevant product committees.
• Ensure that the required portfolio reviews are completed, review the results and make recommendations to the business leaders on how their business activities should be tweaked to improve portfolio performance.
• Ensure systems used for implementing collections strategies are fit for purpose and identify and specify enhancements by confirming strategies are working as required and as per implementation plans.
• Manage and control all compliance, mandatory and regulatory accountability relating to collections and ensure both collectors and credit managers understand their risk obligations. These will include the National Credit Act (NCA), and the Enterprise Risk Management Framework (ERMF).

Stakeholder and Relationship Management

• Coordinate and communicate collections activities with the respective BUs, Risk and Operations teams.
• Drive close collaboration with the Operations teams and instill a co-operative and conducive working relationship.
• Secure support from Collections and Recoveries Operations, Risk Teams, MI, Business teams, Finance, Product, Payments, Technology and HR to deliver collections programs.
• Participate in the BU Exco / Manco meetings to ensure adequate communication and understanding of senior managers in the BU around the analytics-based methodology used by Risk and decision-making, and the benefits thereof.
• Support the BUs to deliver impairment targets and Loan Loss Rates aligned with the forecasting by providing proactive analysis and guidance on how to manage credit risk within acceptable levels.
• Establish credit risk modelling and measurement procedures and systems
• Help identify and drive cross-sell and up-sell opportunities in the portfolio and identify pre-qualified business that can be targeted by the BUs in order to grow the portfolios.
• Liaise with various internal stakeholders (e.g. Risk Management, Credit Lending, Product Head, IT and Enablement, Payments, Technology, Group Risk) to secure their respective support in the implementation of changes to the credit underwriting strategies and ensuring capacity exists to implement.
• Review and report strategy performance and trends to the Everyday Banking, Portfolio Quality Review Meeting, Retail Credit Risk Committee, Group Risk teams, and Product Teams.

People and Culture

• Builds and sustains a culture that aligns to Everyday Banking and Risk’s aspirational colleague experience to deliver the target customer experience and financial performance.
• Ensure delivery of business goals by aligning Performance Development (PD) Plans of direct reports to the business goals.
• Instill a performance development culture through directing the PD process and adhering to the PD calendar.
• Pro‐actively identify development areas of direct reports and compile development plans to address them.
• Attract and retain talent, with the assistance from the HR Business Partner.
• Interview and recruit new members of the team, including determining appropriate compensation levels with input from HR.
• Identify team capabilities and develop a succession plan, with the assistance from the HR Business Partner.
• Initiate disciplinary action process as and when required, with the assistance of the Employee Relations Consultant.
• Act as the first line of escalation for all grievances.
• Conduct monthly meetings with the team to address performance gaps.
• Effectively lead team members and ensure their efforts are recognized.
• Ensure execution of plans seeking to address employee related issues ‐ e.g. Colleague Engagement Survey (CES) action plans.

Control

• Accountable for ensuring an optimal and complaint control environment within the product that appropriately balances collections activities and customer experience with the need to grow to achieve the financial ambitions.

Education and experience required

• Honours Degree in Mathematics and / or Statistics or equivalent NQF level 8 qualification.
• 8 years of relative banking experience of which 2 years should be in a senior role (preferably Retail Banking).
• Highly numerate and literate.
• Well-rounded credit professional with sufficient management experience.

Knowledge and skills: 

• Knowledge of / in dealing with Retail Bank clients (Expert).
• Proven record of accomplishment in credit management & Sanctioning (Expert).
• Financial analysis and interpretation skills (Advanced).
• Stakeholder Management Skills (Advanced).
• Scorecard development (Expert).
• SAS Skills (Expert).