More visibility into creditworthiness
- Peter van Eendenburg | Credit Manager | EQUANS
Many people know EQUANS from the energy market, but its field of work is much broader. “This ranges from technical projects in construction and infrastructure to maintenance of installations and making robots for factories,” says Peter van Eendenburg. He has worked at EQUANS for over seventeen years and is currently responsible for Energy B2B and Services as Credit Manager.
Together with the sales department of Equans
At EQUANS, credit management and sales are on the same floor. The relationship is very good, although of course they have a different perspective. “From my role, I want to bring in as many customers as possible, but with a calculated risk,” Van Eendenburg says. “If a customer doesn’t come through, we always look together to see if we can still make it possible. Then we limit the risks or possibly build up a deposit. So we really think along with the sale and sometimes even go with the customer. It’s nice to have honest conversations with each other. That way you suddenly see solutions.”
Invoicing and credit check
Invoicing is something EQUANS has paid close attention to from the beginning. “That’s hugely important in this sector, because the invoice is often the only thing the customer sees from us. We’re talking about over 40,000 customers, so then that really has to be in order.” He also calls checking creditworthiness essential. The diversity in the portfolio of EQUANS makes it difficult to discover trends. Many customers also come in via intermediaries. Van Eendenburg: “So you have to check the creditworthiness extra carefully and be able to react quickly. We rely heavily on the external expertise of CreditDevice. We fully trust that they can monitor this best.”
- "EQUANS' customer acceptance policy hinges on the quality of credit information.
Small and flexible organization
Since last April, there has been a pleasant partnership with CreditDevice. “We knew each other from a tender eight years ago. In that time CreditDevice has grown enormously in terms of content. If you look at how they make the difference compared to other parties, it is particularly in the field of automation. In addition, they listen seriously to our questions and they keep their promises. They always think along with us when it comes to what we need. For example, we also use the data for marketing purposes, which fits in extremely well with our wishes. I have also noticed in practice that a somewhat smaller, flexible partner is very pleasant. In short, they are close to us and deliver quality.”
Easy to report
Van Eendenburg can report much more easily than before. In the past, if he saw a risk and wanted to communicate it in the right way to the right colleagues, it took him a long time. Because at each level, of course, different information is relevant. “Thanks to the CreditDevice software, I can now easily create a customized report for the relevant branches. In this way they know in time what is going on and what they have to be alert to.
Clear credit information
Van Eendenburg used to spend a lot of time manually pulling together all kinds of information. He is therefore very enthusiastic about the credit reports that CreditDevice provides. “With more extensive reports there is always an explanation. Exactly the kind of text that we used to type in ourselves when someone requested a report. So convenient that we don’t have to do that anymore! Especially when you consider that the Services Department of EQUANS consists of about twenty companies that all come to us for the credit checks. Such a solution of CreditDevice is fantastic: we can send the reports immediately. The information is understandable for everyone: we don’t have to add anything and get fewer questions. That is appreciated on all sides!”
Benefits of Risk Analysis
Thanks to the cooperation with CreditDevice, credit management at EQUANS runs more smoothly. The RisicoAnalyse plays an important role in this, as it has provided more insight into the customer portfolio. “Every day we prepare files for this. We also receive an alert if something is wrong with a customer. This not only enables us to take action more quickly, but we also have a cleaner and more complete database. I think that’s a big plus. With other suppliers, we didn’t deliver the payment information in such a structured way on a daily basis, but I now see how well that works.”
