The leading lights in the UK’s finance and insurance sector came together at New Dock Hall in Leeds last month, for the annual industry celebration – the F&I Conference and Awards.
The judging panel was made up of the cream of the UK’s F&I industry – so bagging one of the awards was no easy feat. We caught up with the evening’s winners, to find out what winning means to them.
Next up it’s Matt Ellis, business manager at RRG Group Toyota Altrincham, who picked up the award for Business Manager Of The Year.
Congratulations on being named as F&I’s Business Manager of the Year, Matt. First and foremost, tell us a bit about your role at RRG Group.
My role is to support and coach the sales executives through the sale of a vehicle. I aim to help them understand how to maximise profit and ensure that all customers are offered the correct finance and insurance products.
How does it feel to be recognised by your peers as Business Manager of the Year?
Since joining RRG as a Trainee Sales Executive back in 2010 I’ve always committed myself to be a winner. This has been well recognised within RRG, and the team has given me plenty of promotional opportunities. Being named as Business Manager of the Year makes me and my family very proud – it’s taken years of hard work and dedication, but this makes it all worthwhile!
It wasn’t all about the black tie though, did you attend the F&I Conference during the day? If so, what were the top three things you took away from the event?
Yes, I was there for both the day and night events. I was impressed by the commitment from all of the winners and nominees, and I spent a lot of time networking, but, above all, it was also great to see the potential opportunities within the F&I world.
What top three things do you think the F&I industry needs to consider in 2019?
For me, it would have to be the need to continually review and look for ways to simplify the customer sales journey. Rewarding and recognising the high achievers and making the compliance side of thing easier for customers and sales executives is also important.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Thanks for the awards! The event was an amazing set up and brought together great people, great food and great speakers!
Organised and hosted by DealTrak and sponsored this year by Barclays Partner Finance, the not-for-profit fundraiser for the NSPCC celebrated its eighth birthday in 2018. All areas of automotive finance were represented, from lenders, dealers, brokers and product and service providers with best practice highlighted, celebrated and championed throughout.
Check out the full list of F&I awards winners here.