APPENDIX THREE
CORPORATE MEDIATOR
The FSB believes government should give close
consideration to creating a Corporate Mediator tasked with the
role of mediating between banks and their business customers where
disputes arise. We envisage that the mediation service would be
available to any business owner encountering difficulties with
banks in solving his or her financing problems.
Good relations between business owners and banks
underpin a successful and healthy economy. Unfortunately recent
events, combined with the gradual centralisation of decision making
in the banks, have bred mistrust in both parties.
As well as facilitating dialogue between business
and the banks, a Corporate Mediator could also perform the important
function of communicating the array of support packages on offer
to the business community. The FSB thinks that a Corporate Mediator
would also be better placed to report the true situation regarding
business lending.
Such a facility could be established in a relatively
short period of time, as has happened in France and Belgium where
Corporate Mediators now exist.
Corporate Mediators have been established in
France and Belgium:
— The Corporate Mediator is entrusted to
the Knowledge Centre for Belgian SME Financing, by the supervising
authority of the federal government.
— This measure is enshrined within the
framework of the federal plan for SMEs and within the Federal
Government's economic revival programme.
— It is a mediation service within the
BeCeFi that is accessible to any company, company head, craftsman,
shopkeeper, professional person or individual entrepreneur encountering
difficulties with banks in solving his, her or its financing problems.
— The parties mentioned above can contact
the Corporate Mediator via its website or by telephone.
The Corporate Mediator operates based on the
following missions:
— To ensure a contact point for each entrepreneur
encountering financing problems and to leave no SME on its own
when confronted with such problems. Its motto is "No company
should be left on its own with its difficulties".
— Analyse the files and to examine their
situations concretely in order, whenever possible, to propose
solutions and to advise the government of all main unsolved problems
and, if necessary, to propose solutions.
— To facilitate dialogue and consultation
between the companies and their financial institutions.
— To inform about public economic support
measures and to act in concert with the various ad hoc organisations.
— To play, if necessary, a mediation role
with the other public authorities (tax collectors, semi-public
social security collectors, and so on).
— To report periodically to the authorities
with suggestions and recommendations.
May 2009
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