Critical article on the lending experience at FC CE

Steve T,

I have no current arguments with FC's recoveries team - as I posted only five minutes ago my personal losses are small and I took early evasive action to ensure they remained that way. However, unless they are all phantom posts on FC's web site there are a lot of unhappy bunnies out there.

Clearly, I will have to crawl back under my stone and wait another few years before I can come out and play with the big boys who have the length of experience to know everything I clearly don't.

Funny, but I do seem to be doing quite well financially with my investments thank you - but I guess that must just be all good luck - what could I possibly know eh?!?!

SteveT

It is still my personal opinion that the chocolate teapot analogy is appropriate.

I don't have to be in current dispute with the recoveries team to hold such an opinion - I just keep a broad perspective, abreast of developments and my finger on the pulse (as far as that's possible).

I also try to avoid the somewhat myopic perspective that I'm discovering to be all too prevalent on this forum.

P.S. You know what they say - when in a hole, stop digging!

Blender,

OK - let's look at the minutiae of your last post:

1. It was mrclondon who used capitals in emphasis - as in 'I have been VERY impressed with FC's recovery efforts ....'. My response using italics simply mimicked his emphasis and was actually meant to be lightly amusing as well as make my point. Hence this will likely have been lost on you as it requires the reader to have a sense of humour.

2. I was also allegedly 'accusing another contributor of not being what he/she claims to be..'. However, what I actually said was 'maybe' (a covert lobbyist...) - this is a question - defined as such by the fact there is a question mark at the end of that line. Hence, it could not be said to be accusatory because I have merely asked a question, not made a statement. There was also an exclamation mark with that question mark - in emphasis of the light hearted nature and suggesting banter - again that was seemingly lost on you.

You have made a sterling defence of mrclondon - I'm sure he will be most impressed with your tenacity - you may even get another stripe.

I am now going out - something I think you might want to consider doing more often?

P.S. Until yesterday I had no idea who mrclondon was - thank you for providing illumination.

SteveT

I was referring to the hole that you are in.

With regard to humour on the forum - learned that lesson big time. I have noted what you say - that it is advised to use an emoji to indicate to the reader 'stop, humour here' - silly old me expecting that sound written English alone would suffice without providing some images to help The Sun readers eh!?

MOD HAT ON:

All: Lets ensure that forum rules are adhered to and that we remain nice to one another, which on the whole most participants on this thread have endeavoured to maintain.

rxdav : I don't know whether you are in a hole or not, but you are frankly skating on thin ice. No-ones view on here is sacrosanct, and no particular weight should be given - other than on matters of board admin - just because someone is a member of the board staff. Forumites choose to give whatever weight they like to the opinions and knowledge of others based on history and critical assessment of what is contributed. 

Looking through this thread it is clear that you have made multiple posts which are accusatory, seriously questioning of other members motivations, questioning their 'independence', when they have supported other peoples opinions, and frankly used inflammatory language. You may have been irked by others responses, but in general they look reasonable, and if you throw mud around in the way did you should expect a level of robust response.

If you wish to continue discussion on this topic then ensure you address this going forward. But in the absence of you contributing numbers in terms of actual recovery rates, and / or comparison with industry performance of similar situations, it would seem to me that there is little more to be said, and that the conclusion can be largely summarised as:

- You think that FCs recovery team are as useful as a chocolate frying pan
- Others who have posted who have direct numbers either don't have a judgement or believe they are doing somewhere between reasonable and decent job

Please don't choke on the drink rxdav. Recovery is a long and slow process if you expect quick results then you are investing in the wrong sector. The results of the FC team are about what I would have expected. I have been with FC from the early days and have 110 defaults of which 8 have been a total or close to total w/off, 7 have seen full recovery and of the remainder I am currently at 26% recovery. To be honest in my business experience this is about right and I expect recoveries to probably end up at around 50% - pretty good by normal commercial standards.

If just discussing recovery rate it does not matter how many loans in total, just that the number of defaults is large and the time held long enough to see recoveries. 110 defaults over 5 years (though presumably increasing over time) is about the best data we will get. In comparison my 8 defaults over 4 years not statistically useful. 26% looks ok to me - beating FC's overall 21% probably because of fewer recent investments. I think 50% ending up may be possible for a historical portfolio, though optimistic, but I believe that in future FC will fine tune their processes on assessment and recoveries to meet the loss rates with a bit of slack, and that they will not spend more than they need to on the recoveries budget. They will have to plan to make a profit.