The
UK's leading High Court enforcement agency, Essex-based
Shergroup, has won a major credit industry award for developing
an innovative system for managing court judgments.
The company, based in Braintree, developed its unique
online case management system to allow its clients to
track the progress of writ enforcement in real time.
The SHERPA system scooped the 'Innovative Solution of
the Year' award at the Institute of Credit Management
awards, held on February 17th.
Shergroup's Chief Executive Claire Sandbrook said:
"This is a fantastic accolade as it reflects our
continuing commitment to develop imaginative services
that best meet our clients' needs. At a time when people
are looking for the best solutions to their debt recovery
problems, we are confident we can offer a service that
goes way beyond that of our competitors."
Shergroup uses the SHERPA system to enforce High Court
Writs of Fi Fa through its Sherforce brand, as well
as managing the collection of judgment debts which are
outside the scope of the High Court, through its Sherforce
Plus brand.
Shergroup´s team of experienced and professional
officers report details about their visits to debtors'
premises on Blackberry devices and this information
and accompanying photographs are then made available
online by Shergroup's team in India.
Three of the senior management team - Claire Sandbrook,
Chief of Operations Alan Smith and Chief of IT David
Asker, collected the award. Claire said: "It has
been a real team effort to build SHERPA into the system
it is today and we have been helped in its development
by our officers, internal teams and all of our clients.
We plan exciting months ahead for further development
of the system using its back-end database, which is
probably the most comprehensive database of judgment
debt results in England and Wales."
Shergroup's Chief of IT, David Asker, who has worked
in developing the global network for SHERPA said: "By
providing up-to-date information, our clients can see
at a glance what stage we are at in the debt recovery
process. They also have a wealth of management information
at their fingertips which is especially useful if we
are handling hundreds of cases on their behalf."
Shergroup was nominated for the award by client Rachel
Taylor, from the Oriel Group, who said: "Historically
we used County Court bailiffs but found them to be ineffective.
Rarely did they provide us with any information about
why their recovery rate was so poor. By switching to
High Court enforcement and using the SHERPA system,
we can see so much more information, even photographs
of what it looks like walking up the debtor's path to
their front door."
It is the second year in a row that Shergroup has won
this award as last year it received the same award for
establishing Shercar, the online DVLA look-up system,
which helps enforcement officers check the ownership
of vehicles which are seized to pay court fines, judgments,
and local authority debts.
Photo shows David Asker, Claire Sandbrook and Alan
Smith and with the Institute of Credit Management award
for 'Innovative Solution of the Year'.
