Bank’s recovery agents thrash couple

Agents of a private bank have landed in soup for thrashing a couple to recover credit card debt.
Initially, the police hesitated to take action but when mediapersons arrived on the spot, five recovery agents — including Prabhu, Somashekhar, Mallesh and Sundar — were taken for questioning and a case was registered.
on Tuesday, the agents barged into a cloth shop run by Balu and Prameela at Seshadripuram, and beat up the couple.
By withdrawing Rs 30,000, the two had reached the limit of a credit cards they had taken from a bank. The couple has, over the past two years, been paying the minimum amount to meet interest, according to the bank.


Accused the police of being soft on the agents. “They didn’t listen to the argument that RBI and Supreme Court directives prohibit recovery agents from taking law into their hands,’’ he said.

Balu produced receipts to prove he was repaying the money for the past two years. “Whatever we pay is going towards interest and service charges.

Improved bond rating benefits taxpayers

The three major credit-rating agencies have bumped up Louisiana bond ratings a notch, which officials say will save taxpayers tens of millions of dollars in financing costs on government projects.

"We deserve the rating increase," state Treasurer John Kennedy said in an interview.

Agencies took note both of recent state ethics reforms and ongoing economic development when making the decision, Kennedy said.

"This is going to make it easier to borrow money, and it’s also a selling point for economic development for an out-of-state company," he said.

States, including Louisiana, issue bonds to borrow money, usually for big long-term projects like roads and buildings.

Like a credit rating for an individual, the bond ratings, based on the financial strength and and reliability of the entity issuing it, factor into the interest rates available for financing.

Earlier this month, Standard & Poors raised the state’s genera-obligation- and appropriations-debt ratings to A+, from its previous A rating. Moody’s Investors Service upgraded the general obligation rating to A1 from A2, and Fitch Ratings to A+ from A.

Though the agencies used different codes for those ratings, the state now enjoys the highest rating in a category deemed to be upper-medium-grade bonds. The ratings range from the very risky, CCC, to the most secure at AAA or Aaa.

Kennedy arranged a conference call two or three weeks ago with the agencies to ask them to raise the rating, which, given the result, went over well.

"We had been working for a long time" on the increase, Kennedy said.

The ratings increase will return the bond ratings to the level the state had before Hurricane Katrina, after which the rating was downgraded, Kennedy said.

"Louisiana’s economic and fiscal recovery after Katrina has been impressive," Moody’s said in opinion on the decision to upgrade the rating. The agency calling the outlook "stable" and cited the state’s $1 billion cash surplus, higher tax revenue and increased use of federal disaster-relief money.

Louisiana still trails other stated in terms of its bond ratings. Along with California, it is dead last among states in the ratings.

"It’s no different than having your credit rating improve," said Michael Ferdinand, CEO of the Terrebonne Economic Development Authority, which works with state GO Zone bonds. "By having an increased recognition of fiscal responsibility, that will allow to entities to engage more cost-effective financing ...

"It reduces the cost of doing projects, therefore you can do more projects."

Kennedy said he plans to ask for another ratings increase in six months to a year and ultimately bring up the rating two notches to be on par with top states like North Carolina.

One year in, HMV reaps benefits of recovery plan

HMV has announced that its turnaround plan is ahead of expectations, announcing a set of market-beating results. Reporting on continuing operations for the year ended April 26th, the group saw total sales growth of 11.3% including a like-for-like sales increase of 7.3%.
HMV out-performed the Waterstone’s division, with like-for-like sales at the DVD and music retailer up 11.4% compared to a 3.3% rise at the bookstore chain. Profit before tax and exceptional items for the group was up 25.2% to £56.6 million and net debt was “virtually eliminated” in the period, coming in at £0.2 million. These results exclude HMV Japan, which was disposed of during the year for £70.6 million.
The company also saw strong market share performance across all product categories in the year, with games and technology growing rapidly and now comprising 21% of all HMV UK & Ireland sales, up from 14% in 2007. A successful trial of the company’s next-generation HMV store formats will see a further roll out in 2008/09.
In a statement, chief executive Simon Fox said: “One year into our transformation plan, group profits are up by 25% and we are ahead of where we expected to be. We still have much to do, and whilst we are mindful of the challenging economic outlook, the current financial year has started in line with our expectations and I remain confident that we are building a better and stronger business that can prosper in a rapidly-changing market”.
The board also announced that non-executive chairman Carl Symon would be standing down in September after nearly three years.
Commenting, Mr Symon said: “As the foundations are firmly in place, it is an ideal time for me to pursue new interests”.

Financial Data Analyst B-Line, LLC Seattle

B-Line, LLC, a recognized industry leader in the consumer bankruptcy debt purchasing and servicing, has an opening for a Financial Data Analyst. This position will be responsible for its financial data standardization, recovery analysis, reporting in order to aid the underwriting process in its Pricing Department.

The candidate will standardize data input from clients, scrub files for pricing, conduct recovery analysis, facilitate portfolio research, maintain/improve pricing model, monitor existing portfolio performance, write up and present pricing summary with recommendation to the asset acquisition committee. Additional responsibilities include delivering process improvement, providing timely financial analysis, communicating effectively with management and peers regarding business/portfolio issues and driving business initiatives/decisions through complex modeling and analysis.

B-Line is located in downtown Seattle and offers a very competitive benefits package, including Medical/Dental, FSA, 24 Hour Fitness Gym Membership, Paid Time Off, Community Outreach opportunities and a great 401(k) Plan. This position is eligible for the employee bonus program.

MPs hit at efforts over benefit errors

The amount of benefit lost through overpayments by error has almost doubled to £2bn over the past five years, easily exceeding the amount saved from reducing benefit fraud over the same period, according to MPs.

A report published on Tuesday by the parliamentary public accounts committee criticises benefit recovery by the Department for Work and Pensions after frauds were uncovered. It warns government-imposed staff cuts will constrain the “ability to identify fraud and recover overpayments”. MPs call for more fraudsters to be prosecuted, better debt recovery and targeted training for benefit staff to cut errors.

The DWP was required by March this year to axe 30,000 jobs to save £960m a year as part of a broader efficiency drive by government. According to the committee, the department has lost 17 per cent of prosecution staff since 2003. The DWP, however, told MPs it was “compensating for the loss of staff by making more effective use of its counter-fraud resources than ever before”.

The committee welcomed the fall in reported annual levels of fraud from £2bn in 2001-02 to £800m in 2006-07, but said £700m of the reduction was due to a department decision that overpayments of disability living allowance and related benefits “should no longer be considered fraudulent”.

Edward Leigh, committee chairman, said: “Fraud is one thing, error another – although determining which is which in the case of claimants can be difficult. The estimated amount of benefit lost each year to error by customers and officials has nearly doubled over five years to almost £2bn a year. This is not acceptable.

“The DWP must direct its training and compliance checks on those local offices and benefits which prove to have the highest error rates.” The complexity of benefit schemes encourages errors, says the report.

Mr Leigh welcomed the fact that the department was “working more closely with the police and local authorities to frustrate fraudsters” but said there were areas for improvement. Only £22m out of £339m “known fraud debt” was recovered in 2006-07, and only 7,500 fraud cases went to court out of 200,000 “where the department considered there to be a high probability of prosecution”.

Mr Leigh said: “Where it [the DWP] detects attacks by organised crime it must take a firm and co-ordinated approach. It must get a lot better at tracking down and recovering fraud debt. It must get a firm understanding of the cost-effectiveness of its counter-fraud activities, otherwise it cannot know that it is targeting its resources to best effect. And it should increase the deterrent effect of its investigation work by taking a much higher proportion of cases of potential fraud to court.”