Credit Matters Newsletters

We are pleased to announce we now have 80 business and associated professional bodies listed in our Better Business Club.

Advertising via Credit Matters

If you are interested in reaching a wider group of business prospects, contact Kim to see what we can do for you. For instance, you will note the attached flyers with this newsletter from:

Debt Recoveries, JMA Credit Control and IDOM are three businesses which recently joined the Better Business Club and have provided an introductory brochure of their services.

There is a growing trend by corporate enterprises to request their suppliers not to send a monthly statement of their trading account. It seems for some reason, management of these enterprises, believe money can be saved by asking their suppliers to manage their (the customer's) accounts for free.

This is an interesting concept in our "... user pays world" where it seems almost every service seems to have a charge these days. Alternatively we also see the other side of the coin where business managers are trying to reduce their expenses. Accordingly, some business managers will always try to get something for free notwithstanding another well-known concept "... nothing in this world is free!"

However if you thought asking your suppliers to work for nothing and this would save a few dollars, I suggest you are seriously misguided. In my experience, suppliers which "manage" their customers' accounts often do very nicely. One such supplier made so much money they part funded the operating costs of their Accounts Department at the expense of those customers which did not want to manage their own accounts.

Incidentally, there are another set of issues at stake. It would appear if you do not want a monthly supplier statement, you also do not want to know the total of your firm's current liabilities, or how much it really costs to manage your Accounts Payable liabilities.

In light of these issues, your conundrum is: are you happy to guess your corporate enterprise is saving money or would you rather prove you are saving money? 

This month's quote is particularly relevant in today's business environment and is a subject which I touch on regularly in my blogs. We live in a constantly changing and evolving world, both socially and commercially.

Unfortunately when I look around the business community today, two business aspects stand out.

1  Many business organisations are stuck in the past due to poor or under-developed management thinking and actions.

2  The amount of influence people from outside the business world have and which in the main, negatively affects our business enterprises and outcomes.

At this point, I could get on my soap box and really let rip with what I see happening in the world around us. Unfortunately, apart from venting my frustrations and anxieties, that will not achieve much.

Therefore let us review what is happening in society and see how these issues will affect our business world.

The main issues in society today are I believe:

(i) a lack of self-discipline, both socially and commercially;

(ii) an attitude of "I want it now", which we see in the actions of many people in their daily lives, in business decisions and from investors;

(ii) "I have a right to it" attitude which we see around us and one of the key influences on why fraud occurs in business;

(iii) money is the main driver of our behaviours, again both in our social inter-actions and business relationships where often it appears, nobody wants to pay a fair price anymore;

(v) drugs and gambling, which are blight in modern times and often the cause of theft and fraud within both social and business environments;

(vi) fear about work security and a lack of employment opportunities.

In each of these issues, we note how being a good citizen and being prepared to work honestly for the long term, has changed. Now it appears the two main drivers of peoples' behaviour is focused on "what's in it for me", and "I want the money now and do not care how I get it!"

Now I know these themes and issues do not apply to everybody. However these themes definitely do apply to a significantly larger proportion of the population today than they did in the past. The causes of such behaviours today are directly influenced by changes in society within which we live. Furthermore as the monthly quote suggests, the type of behaviour which we see in the society, will in time, become self-evident in the business world.

If you understand these issues, you can see such behaviours in the business world now, either though the behaviour of your suppliers, customers and employees. With such understanding you can create operating systems and processes which will maximise your sales, cashflow and profits.