Published on 03 August 2010

A drive among lessors to improve process, retain clients and to be more agile has put renewed focus on the effectiveness of their IT systems.

Automated systems and online facilities have become more or less commonplace among lessors as they strive to keep business practices up-to-date and cost-effective. Now software providers report a shift in attitude among those investing in IT.

The new focus is on efficiency and ensuring large volumes of business – including cross-border deals – can be handled quickly, cheaply and easily, with software providers looking to upgrade their established products to accommodate this.

Asset and motor finance software provider CHP Consulting recently updated ALFA to version 5, and is now preparing to launch its version 5 for fleet.

Andrew Denton, sales and marketing director at CHP, said: “Not much has changed, which is important for our positioning. It’s a migration, not a rewrite. We’ve been putting functionality into our software for 20 years. We know it’s working, it’s industry led and it’s got an existing client base. If you rewrite from scratch, there’s no way you can catch up on 20 years.”

Behind the progression is a drive to make it as easy as possible for customers to move from one version of the system to the next.

While lessors have become more reliant on software to support their business, they are now demanding better returns from their investment in technology, especially since the economic downturn.

“Customers want a tangible payback. Reading between the lines, people are buying for subtly different reasons than they were in good times. They are now thinking more about costs and there has been a shift away from sales to process enablement. People are thinking, ‘how do I use tools like workflow to make the process faster?’” Denton said.

As lessors have become more sharply focused on retaining existing customers, the transparency of their systems, as well as speed and efficiency, has become crucial.

Denton said: “The shift is to making more from less. If there are fewer customers in the market, you’ve got to look at retention. You have to ensure you’re not losing too many customers. People want to understand the risk inherent in the way they do business. It is very difficult to sell a system that doesn’t include transparency.”

The above was published online by Leasing Life in August 2010.
Reproduced by permission of the publisher.