More compliance at Briqwise

Briqwise is a healthy growing company. Business activities are developing rapidly and more and more customers know where to find us. Both entrepreneurs and investors are satisfied with Briqwise's solid and personal approach to establishing and maintaining financing. In order to maintain this level of service and security as a growing company, we decided to formalize and better streamline the internal and external processes. For that reason, we have appointed a compliance manager who monitors all relevant official regulations in the financing industry and checks whether Briqwise complies sufficiently with them. He also ensures that internal processes are properly defined and that customers can communicate with Briqwise in a transparent manner.

ECSP license

This has been spurred by the introduction of a licensing requirement for the non-bank financing sector from the European Union, intended to better protect investors. This ECSP license contains measures to ensure the provision of information to investors. This also includes the complaints policy and complaint procedures, the handling of IT security incidents and privacy incidents. Briqwise recently received this permit from the AFM.

Complaints procedure

Tom Dutilh, our new compliance manager, helps to draw up and implement measures to meet the licensing requirements, and regularly checks that the rules are being properly implemented. One of the ECSP requirements is that there is a specific complaint form on the website. Tom: “Of course, Briqwise also believes it is important that investors who have complaints or are dissatisfied can express their concerns in an accessible way. That is why a complaint form that is as clear as possible has been drawn up and placed on the website. Customers can also still simply call and transfer their complaints over the phone if they prefer. For completeness, we finally added the official EU standard form to the website. I regularly check that the complaint forms are still working properly.”

Cooling

Many of the regulations contained in the permit contain nothing new under the sun for Briqwise. For example, there is a requirement that a cooling period is introduced. “Once the investor claims financing, he has four days to refrain from doing so. That has never been a problem with Briqwise anyway, but now it has been formally laid down in the documentation.” In line with this, Briqwise has written down its internal processes in detail, so that no misunderstandings can arise about them either. This includes, for example, the claims process and the allocation process.

Credit assessment

These procedures can seem a bit cumbersome and formal, but according to Tom, the regulations in the ECSP permit have been carefully considered. Tom: “One of the focus points of the permit, for example, is the credit assessment. How safe is an investment? Briqwise has never had problems with this either, but for the record, that assessment must now be done according to standard procedures and stored in standard files. It's up to me to check that those files are complete, so that there are no misunderstandings or disagreements. Appointments are therefore recorded even more carefully and omissions disappear. Fortunately, this is not at the expense of the speed with which financing can be arranged via Briqwise.”

Identity check

Financial services require more and more extensive checks on the identity and background of investors and entrepreneurs. This is to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing. Banks have a lot to do with it; they are obliged to 'know' their customers well.

Like many other parties, Briqwise therefore uses Onfido, a software program that checks the identity of participants, when making payments. This should ensure that every entrepreneur who borrows money through Briqwise is a reliable, honest party, and vice versa that an entrepreneur knows that his financier has also made fair use of his assets. Tom: “There are many criteria by which participants are checked, and not every report from the program immediately reveals a serious offence. Onfido remains advisory: Briqwise decides which people it rejects or allows. In practice, it's all not that bad. I don't see a sanctioned Russian oligarch coming to Briqwise to invest his assets here incognito. But the idea of these screenings provides just a little bit more of a sense of safety. After all, organized crime and money laundering are becoming increasingly sophisticated. That's why we also see identity checks as a kind of social duty of care.”

Own financing by Briqwise

There has been more transparency about the circumstances in which Briqwise itself intervenes as a financier. This sometimes happens, for example, when customization needs to be provided to complete a club deal. “By the way, that was already well arranged, Briqwise claims that an investment here is 'no hassle'. It's just that it has become more transparent now. Investors can also see how many companies are being helped by Briqwise and how many loans were delayed by more than 90 days, which will give a certain amount of confidence in the integrity of the organization.”