Announcements Made on the Simplification of Ownership Administration: Full Marks to BHA and ROA.

Ever since I’ve been involved in owning horses the duplication, complexity, expense and hassle of ownership administration has been a complete pain in the backside. I have often joked that it was probably easier back in the days of Queen Anne. Even the postman who comes to our house regularly takes the micky out of the huge postbag of Weatherbys-related correspondence. It has probably taken a decade to learn how to deal with it all, which shows how complicated it can be – particularly when you’re running partnerships with multiple owners.

On the serious side though, it is not just the needlessly complex admin. There is a strategic dimension to the whole subject. The BHA, in its strategy for growth, is determined to bring more owners into the sport and retain those they already have. Anything which is potentially a barrier to that has to be properly addressed and changed. As Charlie Liverton, CEO of the Racehorse Owners Association, said last week when a raft of ownership reforms was announced: “Owners have long complained that their first steps on the road to ownership were characterised by red tape and confusing ownership structures, followed by numerous fees.” Encouragingly, from next Spring this should change, with a far simpler and much more modern process being introduced. My wife and I are very pleased about this, not least because we’ve taken part in a number of working groups with both the BHA and the ROA, and have made numerous recommendations for changes together with testing some of the proposed changes that are now going to be made. There are three main elements to the new system.

1. Digitalising administration: a new racing administration web site for owners is being launched. Through an online hub, which will be supported by a telephone help desk, owners will be able to register, update and maintain ownerships digitally, removing the vast majority of paper-based forms. In addition owners will be able to set up sponsorships, register an authority to act and check and pay invoices, all online. These changes will make it much easier and quicker to complete any necessary administrative requirements associated with being an owner.


2. Simplifying ownership structures: in Owners for Owners we describe ourselves as forming joint ownerships, thereby encouraging co-owners to be genuine owners of horses. However it has never been easy simply to describe the differences between, say, co-owners, partnerships and syndicates. Having said that, many of our owners are with us because we are not a “syndicate”. There is certainly a lot of confusion around the different types of ownership, and the plan now is to streamline the eight types down to five: sole, partnership, syndicate, racing club and company. Sole and company ownerships will remain the same. Partnerships will be designed for small groups of registered owners who are looking to share the responsibility and liability for their horse(s) (the Owners for Owners offering). Syndicates will become the ownership vehicle for entities which have been formed through a public offering to consumers and / or one that has an individual managing it (e.g. a syndicator). In future the syndicator will become responsible for the syndicate, replacing the current requirement for two nominated partners from within the group. In a racing club, the horse(s) are owned by the club with members paying a subscription fee.


3. Consolidation of fees: along with simplifying the registration process, both new and existing owners alike will benefit from the alignment and bundling of ownership fees. Rather than charging a number of different fees at various stages through the year, fees for the registration and re-registration of colours, an authority to act and VAT will be aligned to one date in the year. New owners will be able to purchase “fee bundles” at the registration stage in order to minimise any additional admin.

All of this is to be welcomed. It will be very interesting to see exactly how the changes are introduced. Regular readers of the blog will know that I was highly critical of Weatherbys Bank when their online banking was updated, which was a change management disaster. Hopefully everyone has learnt from that.

So full marks to both the ROA and the BHA for their part in pushing for these changes to take place. I worked closely with Richard Wayman before he became the Chief Operating Officer of the BHA, and his support for the initiative is warmly welcomed. His views are clear: “At the heart of the sport’s growth strategy is making racehorse ownership more attractive and accessible to both new and existing owners. This will require significant progress in a number of areas, including ownership administration, where there needs to be much greater emphasis on the customer experience. The initiatives announced (on Tuesday 25th October) will address many of the administrative frustrations faced by owners for too long.” Hear, hear!

I am always interested to hear your views so please do leave a comment. If you can't see the comment box at the bottom of this post then navigate to the post using the right hand navigation or click here > and scroll to the bottom of the page. Look forward to hearing your views. Thanks very much for sharing them.

Woeful Weatherbys Fall at the First Hurdle of Technology Change Management – The Frustrating Shambles of their Online Banking Upgrade and Worrying Concerns for 2017+

In the last blog I was very supportive of the statements that Richard Wayman made at a recent BHA strategy forum at Newbury on 1st March relating to a major innovation led by Weatherbys to streamline ownership administration from 2017. He assured the audience that the changes “will put the customer, the owner, at the centre” of the exercise. It would be easy to say, “about time too”, because racing administration is far too expensive, over-complicated and a real burden on those who have to deal with it. Indeed, needlessly costly and frustrating administration is a barrier to owning and one factor contributing to owners leaving the sport.

You may know that Weatherbys is a privately-owned company established in 1770. It has 16,000 customers (12,000 racing clients and 4,000 private) and its latest accounts show that it made profits of almost £6m on income of £18.5m. One element of its work is to provide British racing with its central administration under a sole source contract with the BHA. The fees that they charge are not only a source of profit to Weatherbys but also co-fund the BHA. This is hardly guaranteed to drive significant transactional and cost efficiencies. Furthermore, I doubt whether its actual competencies in modern integrated transactional processing have ever been market-tested. It may do a marvellous job with the Stud Book, but that doesn’t guarantee that it has the expertise to design, launch and deliver a modern, owner-friendly, online administrative system.

A project has been running in Weatherbys for over five years to simplify ownership structures, integrate all the administration and transfer it on to this online system so that racing finally moves into the modern era with a highly user-friendly process involving minimal paperwork and easy-to-operate technology. In Owners for Owners we are really looking forward to the system being launched in 2017 – not least my wife who has the unenviable task of doing all our OfO racing administration and VAT reclaims. It is obviously essential that this project is a real success, otherwise it will generate considerable owner negativity, which is what Weatherbys’ latest online banking upgrade has done. At least four success criteria need to be met from a change management perspective and, alas, I’d have major reservations at the moment that Weatherbys can meet them.

1. Owner pull, not Weatherbys push. Whatever system is designed must meet the explicit needs for simplicity and cost-effectiveness of different types of owner. They are the primary stakeholders. Administrators and technologists at Weatherbys’ HQ need to view all changes through their eyes, and not just push out a system that may or may not be fit for purpose.
2. Intuitive, simple and workable. The average age of owners is 57+. Many are not particularly technology-literate and are doing administration from home, where broadband may not be super-fast, and computers and software may not be the latest versions. The new system must be easy to use, operable from home and with a “look, touch and feel” that is owner-friendly and intuitive. 
3. Properly tested. It is incredibly easy in process redesign to have frequent delays that put pressure on planned launch dates. The critical time for stakeholder testing is often skimped. Initial versions are launched too early. Owners must be actively involved in testing the system and have veto rights, with the ROA central to this and ideally the overall project sponsor. Never launch a system such as this until success is guaranteed. 
4. Dramatically reduce cost and complexity. There is far too much paperwork, much of it confusing and repetitious. Delays and errors easily creep into the system. It is slow, costly and stressful. Weatherbys and the BHA should set clear improvement goals, e.g. to reduce racing administration total cost to £100 per owner, per horse; or to have every registration necessary on a one-page form that only has to be inputted once. So what went wrong with the recent Weatherbys online banking upgrade? It doesn’t appear to have had any testing whatsoever; no-one appears to have known much about it prior to launch, and it clearly wasn’t ready, as a number of modifications have already been necessary. Registering a new password and PIN number was far too laborious. Logging on to the new site takes about four times as long as previously, taking 21 key strokes. The new site was designed to enable the user to carry out tasks in one place. In practice though, and particularly if you are operating a number of accounts for different horses, it can be easier to carry out tasks separately by account. In other words, go on the site, select the account you want to operate, check the balance and recent transactions, pay the bill and move on to another account rather than checking balances in one section and then moving on to pay a lot of bills in another. The real disaster though came with the bank statements. Before, my wife had checked these, updated her spreadsheets, filed the VAT returns and received any refunds due by the middle of the month. To her dismay there was no VAT column on the new statements so it was just about impossible to do the VAT return without a separate spreadsheet being emailed to her. When she received this it was a very rudimentary document …. and so the story went on. We have documented a number of these other issues and sent them on to the ROA for discussion directly with Weatherbys.

The big picture on all of this is that if Weatherbys are going to be the lead body for the major administrative changes coming in in 2017, then they must adopt an owner-led change management process. And then on the smaller picture of the detail of all the procedures there has to be far more active testing. If Weatherbys aren’t up to the job, then this whole administrative task could be a prime candidate for market-testing and outsourcing. More about the argument for this in another blog, even if Queen Anne might well turn in her grave at the thought of Weatherbys losing its time-honoured right to manage so much of British racing.

I am always interested to hear your views so please do leave a comment. If you can't see the comment box at the bottom of this post then navigate to the post using the right hand navigation or click here > and scroll to the bottom of the page. Look forward to hearing your views. Thanks very much for sharing them.

“Little e” Resolutions for the Racing Industry – but I can see the pigs flying over Woolley Down

Despite the shocking weather, lots happening on the horse front. Quick Decisson wasn’t able to go to Wincanton when the hurdles / bumpers were abandoned, but will hopefully go to Exeter on 10th February; Shantou Magic had a really good workout at Lambourn during the week, and is only a couple of weeks off coming out; and Houndscourt did us proud with a game 2nd at Lingfield in a jumpers’ bumper. Two runs so far for Owners for Owners – a 1st and a 2nd sets the standard for whichever horse comes out next. Great to see both Timeform and Racing Post very complimentary: “plenty to recommend him on pedigree and should progress over jumps, with his long-term future likely to be over fences” and “ran a fine race on his first start since arriving from Ireland. A point winner at Tinahely in October, he would probably have found the trip on the sharp side, and rates as a decent prospect”. All very encouraging.

In the last blog, I flagged up a number of big recommendations for the racing industry. I’ve been in touch with the BHA about them and had what you might call an “interesting” discussion. More on that in the next blog.

I’m sure everyone has their own list of more immediate changes that could be easily made. Here are my “starters for 10”. As I’m writing it, I can see a flock of large pigs flying over the Woolley gallops!

1.  Racecourses and bookmakers complain of races with seven or fewer runners, particularly novice chases. Why don’t they target the problem ones and have prize-money down to eighth?

2.  Racecourses have done a great job recently with special initiatives, setting up jumpers’ bumpers, switching abandoned races to other tracks etc. Hats off, but why isn’t it done more often?

3.  Racecourses such as Chester have a fabulous Owners and Trainers facility, superb lunch etc. Others are simply shocking. Surely any track should provide something more than a stale bun and a cup of coffee, when we’re often spending £200-£500 just to get a horse to the course?

4.  Integrity of racing is critical. No problems with a crackdown on corruption – there will always be serious breaches, such as the the case of Andrew Heffernan. But two trainers I know very well, Karl Burke and Jim Boyle, were both dealt with very badly indeed and their livelihoods threatened during needlessly protracted and poorly handled investigations. Why do they take so long? I’ll examine Jim Boyle’s case in more detail in a later blog. It’s a disgrace.

5.  Prize money, and the trickle down into the racing industry, has to be improved. All of us should rally behind initiatives from the ROA and the Horsemen’s Group. Why wouldn’t we support them?

6.  Joint ownership, partnerships, syndicates etc. now represent a huge part of the industry. Yet we’re often treated as second-class citizens. How about racecourses targeting us all with special deals, much better facilities and a series of “syndicate races” with big prize money, only open to us?

7.  Racing for Change often talks about “bookending” the season. So why doesn’t that happen properly? Why have the start of the season at Cheltenham clash with Ascot’s Champions’ Day? Why is the start of the Flat such a damp squib nowadays?

8.  The administration and form-filling in being involved as an owner is simply shocking. Every form also has to have a cheque attached to it. I fear that it is a revenue stream for Weatherbys. Why can’t we have one payment (say, £100) and one form that covers everything involved? And online?

9.  The bookmakers are now evading the taxman with offshore gambling to the tune of several billions of pounds a year. How can HM Treasury allow that to happen? Put the legislation together, crack down on evasion and introduce a transaction tax on every bet struck online.

10.  Find a way of putting the welfare of horses and stable staff more centre stage. How do we do that? Don’t have any answers, but would welcome views.

I think I’ve only scratched the surface with these ten! Still lots of pigs flying out there ....