EVERYONE HAS A right to be paid what they are owed, this debt collection agency believes, and this includes its staff. The company's 104 employees get a Fair Deal, winning the JBW Group a 76% positive score for this factor, with no bullying boss but a leader who consulted them on this mission statement. The London-based firm offers a "21st-century service, dispelling old myths that surround the enforcement industry with a modern approach". When enforcement officers are at work they have an electronic control system to schedule their rounds, which uses GPS to get them about efficiently and record where they are. There's an accredited City & Guilds training course to get employees up to speed, an online service called Wecollectyourmoney.com and a Twitter-based recovery operation. People feel excited about where the group is going (90%) and the number of staff increased by almost half last year. People say managing director Jamie Waller runs the organisation on sound moral principles, find his energy and enthusiasm inspiring (both 92%), and have a great deal of faith in him (94%). All three are top eight scores. He recently ran a 10km race to raise money for children's charity Stepping Stones Nigeria, and volunteers for the organisation two days a month. Waller regularly listens to people's ideas through cross-departmental breakfasts with two people from each team (83%). People feel confident about the leadership skills of senior managers (88%), who take it in turns to chair the monthly company meeting. Enforcement agents earn £35,000 a year, and most have performance- and profit-related bonuses. There's a decent contributory pension and a generous paternity benefit of two weeks at full pay and six unpaid. Employees are fairly recompensed both for their responsibilities and relative to others in the firm (both 76%), and feel happy with pay and benefits (80%). Staff go out of the way to help each other (87%, a top 25 score), and nobody ends the day feeling exhausted (66%). People might socialise with colleagues but JBW, which aims "to collect every penny through integrity, hard work and innovation", bans company BlackBerry use at the weekend to keep work and home life in balance (79%). jbwgroup.co.uk
