The Business Reports reporter By Samantha Enslin-Payne:
“The National Credit Regulator (NCR) is honing in on clothing retailers to check their compliance with the National Credit Act.
Gabriel Davel, chief executive of the NCR, said yesterday: “There are a couple of retailers we have issues with. We are doing a conduct review at four retailers.”
He declined to name them but said the NCR would examine the retailers’ upfront disclosure to consumers who applied for store cards.
The act stipulates that when applying for credit, a consumer must be told of the prevailing interest …

The National Credit Act continues to challenge and bewilder, a lot of which goes back to it’s over-ambitious intentions which have been constructed on poor drafting and terminology thatis alien to the South African legal definitions.
Take for example the NCA’s impact on “juristic persons”. A juristic person is “a juristic conception to which legal personality is artificially attributed by either the common law or statute” (ABP 4×4 MOTOR DEALERS (PTY) LTD V IGI INSURANCE CO LTD 1999 (3) SA 924 (SCA) at p929 (6)). Our law has never defined partnerships, …

The National Credit Act continues to challenge and bewilder, a lot of which goes back to it’s over-ambitious intentions which have been constructed on poor drafting and terminology thatis alien to the South African legal definitions.
Take for example the NCA’s impact on “juristic persons”. A juristic person is “a juristic conception to which legal personality is artificially attributed by either the common law or statute” (ABP 4×4 MOTOR DEALERS (PTY) LTD V IGI INSURANCE CO LTD 1999 (3) SA 924 (SCA) at p929 (6)). Our law has never defined partnerships, …

Tom Peters, the management guru, on his website takes a look at the question of getting the right staff by internal branding and building a work culture where people really want to work, Google, Apple and BMW being example of such companies.
What Tom Peters had to say:
“…It was a meeting of HR execs, and the topic was the, yes, the “war for talent.” Now I’ve used the term…The point is that the discussion at the meeting in question was warfare-ish to a significant degree - how to quickly nab the best …

The laws and landscape of credit management have changed a great deal in the last year, particularly with the introduction of the National Credit Act. Is your credit department up to date with the law and requirements of credit management?
The seminar will be an overview for Commercial Creditors presented by Bentley Credit Control (Pty) Ltd.
This is a one day seminar in Cape Town to be held on the 21st September 2007 and Port Elizabeth on the 11th October 2007, at 8.30am for 9am. It is aimed at commercial creditors (businesses …

Business Report‘s Evan Pickworth:
“The South African central bank appeared to make a few telling references to the potential impact of the National Credit Act (NCA) in its quarterly bulletin.
The South African Reserve Bank noted a few times that the Act may be having an effect on a few key components they monitor.
In the introduction it states: “At least initially, the introduction of the NCA from 1 June 2007 did not appear to have much impact on the extension of loans and advances by banks. As the household debt service ratio …

In Business Report by Evan Pickworth:
The South African Reserve Bank quarterly bulletin data showed that while household debt was at a new record high of 76.5% in the second quarter, a more soothing figure was that gross domestic expenditure slowed to 1% in the second quarter from 5.75% previously.
Added to this was that household consumption expenditure slowed to 5.5% from 7.5% in the first quarter.
The slower gross domestic expenditure was seen mainly due to a slower growth in real domestic final demand and a further slowdown in the pace of …

Business Report’s Tonny Mafu reports on latest on the debt counsellor payment debacle:
“Debt counsellors might have to wait another three months before knowing how much they could charge clients, the department of trade and industry (dti) said yesterday.
Debt counsellors have been waiting for the government to decide on the fees they can levy on their clients since the introduction of the National Credit Act in June.
A recent snap survey by Business Report found that some debt counsellors had invested up to R50 000 in setting up offices, but could not …