Victoria/Tasmania

Emily Manna and Kelsey Spencer (both from NCI).

Sherif Hussein (Vic/Tas Division President) with Tony Mackwell (Victorian Managed Insurance Authority), Carole McTavish (Australia Post) and Mary Petreski (Vic/Tas Division Councillor).

Presidents Report

Wow-what a great couple of months the Vic/Tas Division both councillors and members have had with events. I’m so excited to say that we finally jumped over the COVID19 hurdle and were able to run our events. It was nice seeing you all at our events in 2021, Breakfast Session, Networking, National Insolvency Seminars, and in April Economic Breakfast and WINC Luncheon.

As I write, we are currently in the process judging our 2021 Young Credit Professionals with the winner to become the future YCP representative for our Victorian/Tasmanian division and represent our division at the national judging in October. Councillor Amaran Navaratnam looks after the YCP portfolio; each year, he is passionate about driving and help each YCP applicant to get the best outcome from their presentation before sitting in front of the judging panel.

Since Amaran has been looking after the portfolio, we have been successful at Nationals and won the National YCP award; Sunny Sharma and Rebecca Roberts have been winners. 2021 sees two new joint sponsors for both the divisional and national Young Credit Professonals. Thank you ARMA and CreditorWatch. What prestigious awards and a special event. We can’t wait to see you all at the presentation night be it face to face or virtually.

WINC event this year was another milestone and memory that I’ll cherish forever as the President of the Vic/Tas division – calling out a big thank you to our sponsors Equifax, Results Legal and NCI for making this event possible and prestigious.

To my councillors who rally behind me each year to call or email seeking raffle prizes or donations for our auction, endometriosis collected over $4,700. Thank you to each and everyone who continues to support us and prizes.

Rhys Buzza (Reece Plumbing) with Chris Sertic (Equifax).

Our presenter Dean Pearson from NAB.

Our wonderful WINC speaker Tanya De Jonge of Mind Medicine Australia.

Eloise Cowan, Halle Skews, Catrina Galanti (Vic/Tas Division Vice President) and Emily Manna (all NCI). Sherif Hussein presents the raffle prize to Michelle Caruthers (Vic/ Tas Councillor) with Stephen Moloney (AMPAC).

Nicola Beswick (FMD Financial) with Krystal Everitt (Cor Cordis).

Thank you to Robyn Erskine for stepping into my shoes this year and being our MC and to all our members and non-members who attended and made this event a success.

We have some great news to announce, we have welcomed Tasmanian Collection Service as a supporting sponsor of our Division, and we look forward to engaging with them with our AICM events in Tasmania. – Sherif Hussein Vic/Tas Division President

Economic Breakfast

Thanks to Turks Legal for being the National Economic Breakfast Sponsor for the AICM in April.

Dean Pearson, Head of Behavioural & Industry Economics, Group Economics at the NAB, was our presenter and shared meaningful insights into human behavior with data and insights into how consumers and businesses behave.

Sitting here today and writing this article made me realise how quickly things change. In Victoria, we have experienced multiple lockdowns, and everything that Dean shared with us around anxiety and how this impacts our behaviors.

These are some of our top concerns that Dean called out, Economy, Travel, Movement Restrictions, Health System unable to cope with demand, Business Closures, and running low on key household essentials, like toilet paper. Even though we went through hard times, more Australians than ever thought Australia is the Lucky Country and a Great place to live.

Not being able to travel and movement restrictions in play, we as consumers changed our shopping behaviors; we were mindful of how we spent our money. We started to support our local businesses and buy Australian

Ruth Hamour (Penrite Oil) and Sue Sutton (PFD Foods).

Lori Popa (National Mercantile) and Sineth Sar (RST Consulting).

products; we started to buy online, search our products, try a new product, change our regular stores, and more innovative with cheaper choices. Take out food, games/toys was where we spent our money. With the government surplus injected last year, we found the extra cash to pay our bills and purchase cars.

Financial anxiety may have fallen, Australians are still experiencing a slight increase in financial hardship over the last 12 months. Australians are still finding it hard to have money saved for emergencies, and credit card options are high for paying off their debts.

What happened to our business conditions rose for all industries, except for mining, wholesale, transport, and utilities. The two significant gains were Manufacturing and Construction. Construction may be the weakest; however, it’s still positive. Favourablen where retail, finance, business and property services, and wholesale from March 19 to March 21.

We also celebrated CCE Recertifications and membership anniversary’s 5, 10, 20, 25, and 30 years. Congratulations to Nella Simeoni, Catrina Galanti, Mary Petreski, Rhys Buzza, Donna Smith, Jeanine Purdie, Ben Willoughby, Sherif Hussein, Vaios Kortikis, Anthony Mackwell, Colman Moloney, and Kim Radok.

Thank you, Mary Petreski, for being our MC and Catrina Galanti for organising the event with AICM Event Manager Brittney Henderson.

Linda Amos, Amanda Chow and Michelle Woo (all iQumulate Premium Funding).

Anna Taylor (Results Legal), with Lynn Quigg and Lilian Bougiouklis (both Ball & Doggett).

Women in Credit (WINC)

On Friday the 7th of May we held our annual Women in Credit luncheon at the RACV club in Melbourne. Before the doors opened to be seated, the positive energy in the room was palpable. Everyone was so happy to be together again and for a good cause.

This year our charity was Endometriosis Australia, as

Jessica Taylor (illion) with Janice Thomason (Bluescope Steel). Susan Nguyen (AGL) with Melanie Woodward (Sharp & Carter).

Your Vic/Tas Division Councillors celebrate WINC: Catrina Galanti, Rebecca Roberts, Michelle Carruthers, Ricky Forster, Alan Izra, Sherif Hussein and Robyn Erskine.

it is near and dear to many of us, and the brave Jamie Boiskin was our speaker. She opened up about her life story and how she has integrated her Endo journey through her career being a creator and performer of the comedy cabaret “Ovariacting: A Period Drama”, a riotous and informative cabaret about periods and Endometriosis.

Through the show, Jamie has raised awareness about Endometriosis and plans to continue creating art that encourages others to educate themselves on Endometriosis and share their own journeys. She encouraged everybody in the room to get checked before it’s too late.

Tanya De Jonge, founder and chair of Mind Medicine Australia and Creativity Australia was our guest speaker for the day. She spoke about developing the left brain and the skills that businesses will need in the years to come including caring, sharing, citizenship, creativity and entrepreneurship. She talked about having more diversity and positive human collisions with people that are unlike ourselves and to jump into our left brain space as often as possible.

A huge thank you to our premium sponsor, Equifax and our two supporting sponsors NCI and Results Legal. Special thanks to CreditorWatch, Kinnon, Gordon Jenkin and Quest for donating the high dollar value gifts for the silent auction. Thanks for the lucky door prize goes to Results Legal and the table prize to Brooke Bird. Also, a big thank you to everyone that donated a prize for the raffle, it’s always so much fun ending the luncheon with the raffle tickets draw where everyone goes home with a gift knowing the contribution the day has made to Endometriosis Australia.

Looking forward to WINC in Tasmania/Hobart on the 10th of September!

Belinda Walker, Dee Tiet, Kim Tu and Katsy Lee (all Adidas). Andrea Wilbourne (JB Hi-Fi), Jamey Balkos (Equifax) and Katrina Bromley (Spicers).

Celebrating the effort that goes into organising such a wonderful day: Catrina Galanti (Vic/Tas Vice President), Robyn Erskine (Vic/Tas Councillor), Sherif Hussein (Vic/Tas Division President), Tanya De Jonge (Speaker), Anna Taylor (Results Legal), Jamie Boiskin (Endometriosis Australia) and Debbie Leo (Equifax)

Members in the Spotlight

Sia Patouras MICM

Managing Director at CollectAU 21 Years of Membership

Sia is the one of the most humble people I know; always smiling and such an amazing business owner! When you get the privilege of meeting her you will know what I mean. She always has time for a heart to heart conversation and is incredibly patient.

Sia has seen a lot of changes in the collections space over her impressive career. As I interviewed her, she took me through her career, from starting in the industry where collection agencies were small family owned firms, to now, with large publicly listed companies. She began her career at Laurens & Co in sales and then RMG as a Client Liaison executive for the banking and finance industry. RMG was the first publicly listed collections agency in Australia. From there she moved across to be part of the team that started Australian Receivables Limited and it was her first chance at having equity in a business.

Taking a trip down memory lane, Sia fondly remembers the late 80/90’s being solely a commercial market for collections, and then the introduction of

Vic/Tas Division President Sherif Hussein celebrating a fantastic day with her guests and colleagues.

Mary Petreski and Michelle Carruthers (both Vic/Tas Councillors) with Belinda Worton (Penguin Random House).

Consumer collections in the mid 90’s which opened up the market to Telcos, local government, Utilities and banks. Keeping up with legislative and regulatory changes has always kept the debt collection industry on its toes.

After roughly 20 years in the collections space, Sia decided to try her hand at Mortgage broking, which is how we connected at an AICM function. Sia found mortgage broking to be more transactional and she missed building long term relationships with her clients. From this realisation, together with all her prior knowledge from her career, CollectAU was born.

When I asked her what she was most proud of with CollectAU she said, “my loyal colleagues and clients and how quickly I was able to build a presence in the market”.

Asking Sia what has kept her a member of the AICM for so long, she said “I love the interaction with credit professionals at events. My favourite event used to be the quarterly dinners and now it’s the conference, where I get to see so many familiar faces and have a conversation outside of work”.

On a personal note, Sia is married with two children; a son that is a lawyer and planning his wedding and a daughter who is completing her university studies and turning 21 this year.

She is also a foodie who loves shopping, yoga and travelling (most recent trip was to Hawaii just before lockdown).

Donna Cortissos and Brooke McGlashan (both MessageMedia).

– Michelle Carruthers MICM

Lilian Bougiouklis

National Credit Manager at Ball and Doggett

At 18 years old, Lilian started out as a clerk for the credit department at Robot trading. Six months into the role she was promoted and that is where she found credit. Shortly after, she was poached by one of their suppliers to do collections, processing of invoices, bookkeeping and all this was before the use of computers.

In 1993 she worked for Dulux as a Credit controller, and then went on to become a supervisor of a team of three Credit controllers in a department of 28 people. She recalls the time when her team would manually send out 1000’s of collection letters. “Each accounts person looked after 2500 accounts”.

After six years Lilian took a job as a credit supervisor at Icon plastics and then was promoted to Credit Manager, where she stayed for 18 years and managed a team of three. She has been able to use her amazing skills and experience to clean up the company’s processes, production, claims area and ledger, all while aiding in acquisition work and being in control of IT, AR, AP, Shipping Imports and Directors property portfolio.

Lilian’s motto in life is to always aim higher, she loves to get her hands dirty and educates her team with a hands-on approach. No job is above or beneath her. What she is most proud of is being one of the pioneers in Australia in respect of quality assurance accreditation, as Dulux was one of only two companies in Australia to be ISO world accredited at the time. With the goal of always aiming higher she also had quality assurance accreditation completed for her finance team.

The story of how Lilian came to be interviewed by Ball and Doggett is fantastic. Her husband, unbeknown to her, applied on her behalf to two recruiters for the job in 2017. Like all her previous roles, she cleaned up their ledger and introduced processes and efficiencies that have made the company who they are today. Just by interviewing Lilian, I can tell that anyone that has worked with her is incredibly lucky to have someone so diverse, knowledgeable and giving by their side.

The thing that Lilian gets the most out of being a member of the AICM is the “consolidation of information”. She confidently knows that the AICM will gather all information relating to credit managers and diligently share that information so that she and her team can learn and be prepared for the change.

Lilian comes from a huge family of five with four sisters and her parents have 18 grandchildren and 19 great grandchildren. Lilian loves to entertain, and Christmas at Lilian’s house has over 40 people. Her three kids are soccer and motorbike fanatics, and she was the treasurer for the South Springvale soccer club as well. – Michelle Carruthers MICM

Lilian Bougiouklis Call out to all Credit managers!! YCP is on the horizon: look in your team for someone (under the age of 30) that is continually striving for excellence and needs to be recognised on a bigger scale!

What it means to be a Young Credit Professional (YCP)

When I am asked the question of what it means to be a Young Credit Professional (YCP), I describe it as being a credit leader for an evolving landscape of consumerism!

The landscape of credit is no longer a true reflection of what Credit Management used to be 20 years ago for retail and commercial credit. With technology, Amaran Navaratnam MICM CCE legislative changes and economic impacts driving financial hardship, YCPs are required to be the driver of success for their organisation and to protect the profit margin by using tools to mitigate financial risk exposure and ensure business continuity.

YCPs are not only protecting the organisation’s financial risk exposure, but are all contributing to protecting Australia’s economy!

Why the YCP award is important?

“I didn’t choose credit, credit chose me” resonates with us

all as we can describe some of the key skill sets such as; relentless drive, leadership and passion for what we do day to day that keeps us in the industry for many years. As a YCP, we are the leaders of the present and the future!

The YCP award recognises all credit professionals, from all paths of credit including origination, credit risk, receivables and legal. appointed the Chairman for the YCP portfolio for Vic/Tas in 2015 and have been managing the portfolio over the last 7 years, with Vic/Tas winning the National award in 2018 and 2020.

Why you should apply for the award?

If you are considering applying for the YCP award in 2021, or in the future, do not give up this opportunity because of your nerves, or, if you struggle with the thoughts of “what if I don’t win?” A YCP nomination is the industry recognition that you deserve!

The YCP award is open to all credit professionals in all paths of Credit Management. It is all of you! – Amaran Navaratnam MICM CCE Chairman – YCPA (Vic/Tas)

The Australian Institute of Credit Management welcomes our Partners for 2021

National Partners

Trusted Insights. Responsible Decisions.

What the YCP award process meant to me?

I will always remember 2014! 2014 was the year that changed my career!

One afternoon, I was called into a meeting room with highly regarded stakeholders of the organisation that I worked for with no inclination of what was about to happen.

I was spoken to about the AICM and the YCP award and being nominated for this prestigious industry-based award, and all this time I simply felt “I am just doing my job”.

I left the meeting room full of excitement and anxiousness, but I knew just being nominated for this award, regardless of the result, was going to be the change I needed for my personal and career development.

The lead up toward the interview required preparation to be across both the commercial and retail credit risk topics. As prepared as I felt, the nerves definitely settled in, but I knew the nerves were there because I was really excited to undergo the entire process.

On the evening of the award ceremony, I was presented with the runner up award, being the ‘Tony Mammone’ award for Vic/Tas. The Tony Mammone award is a commemorative award dedicated to an influential educator and facilitator for the AICM.

Winning the award was the game-changer for my career and my involvement with the AICM as I was soon

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Our National, Divisional and Professional Partners support and work with the AICM to promote the Institute’s activities, represent the Credit Industry and develop the careers of all Credit Professionals. As these organisations support your Institute and your Industry please consider them when you require assistance.