Hitachi Capital Consumer Finance (HCCF), one of the UK’s leading retail point of sale providers, has announced profits of £60.2m and growth in market share.
The results and continued investments during the period leave the business well-positioned to grow in 2021/22 as lockdown measures ease and consumer confidence returns.
In total, Hitachi Capital Consumer Finance lent £1.7billion, including over £1.1billion to 3,200 UK High street and online retail partners. Exceptional growth via digital channels, propelled by a 34 per cent increase in retail point of sale finance merchant integrations to drive online and mail order sales conversions, lead to an 87 per cent increase in lending volumes via e-commerce channels.
HCCF’s personal loans business, Hitachi Personal Finance, gained market share in a suppressed market with new business volumes of £648m, which cemented its position as one of the top 10 providers of personal loans in the UK.
The business unit’s commitment to providing a frictionless, outstanding customer journey for 1.3 million customers, has seen HCCF continue to invest in technology with increased demand for self-service across digital channels, including undertaking improvements to its MyHPF mobile app.
Hitachi Personal Finance was awarded the Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award in 2021 for the third consecutive year and has retained its position as the UK’s Best Direct Personal Loan Provider in the Your Money Awards for seven years running. HCCF also received two European Contact Centre & Customer Service Awards in recognition of the business unit’s response to the pandemic: The Gold award for Responding in a Crisis (supporting colleagues) and the Silver award for Responding in a Crisis (supporting customers).
Vincent Reboul, Managing Director at Hitachi Capital Consumer Finance, said: “Despite a turbulent year, with subdued lending demand and an unprecedented increase in customer contact during the first quarter lockdown, we continued to provide outstanding service to support our customers and retail partners.
“Our agile response to the pandemic, including accelerating our strategic investment in digital channels in order to adapt to the surge in demand via e-commerce channels, enabled us to continue to deliver against our strategic priorities and achieve some very impressive results.
“With a strong recovery in consumer spending expected during the coming months, our business is primed for sustained growth to benefit from an enhanced multi-channel proposition moving forwards.”
At a Group level, Hitachi Capital (UK) PLC has reported a profit before tax (PBT) of £104m for the 2020/21 financial year.
Despite a decline of almost 10 per cent in GDP, Hitachi Capital (UK) PLC generated £3.3bn of new business, with a strong recovery in the second half of the year maintaining Hitachi Capital UK’s level of Net Earning Assets at £5.9bn.
New business volume in the first six months of the financial year 2020/21 recovered to 69 per cent of 2019/20 levels and in the second half of the year, new business volume was at 99.7 per cent of the previous year, despite two further lockdowns.
Robert Gordon, CEO of Hitachi Capital (UK) PLC, said: “The extraordinary resilience, determination and agility of everyone in our business to adapt quickly to the environment has delivered outstanding results during an extremely challenging year.
“Our continued success and recovery, particularly over the second half of the year, has been achieved by adjusting to the pandemic conditions, accelerating our digital capabilities in line with evolving customer expectations and consistently providing outstanding service to businesses and individuals through the range of financial products we offer.
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