With operations across 11 countries, OTP Bank Group has maintained a long-standing partnership with Fluenta. As a client with distinctive needs, OTP presented unique challenges – challenges that Fluenta successfully embraced and overcame. We sat down with Dr. Balázs Lukovics to discuss insights from this partnership.
How does Fluenta’s system support your operations?
Let me begin by pointing out that our use case is rather unique. Though Fluenta’s system is typically deployed for procurement, we actually leverage it for our sales operations.
So, you’re not using it in the traditional way – like sourcing forty laptops and using Fluenta’s system to find the best deal.
Finding the best deal is still crucial for us, but we’re actually using Sourcing for selling rather than buying. Specifically, we sell receivables. Here’s how it works in simple terms: when someone has outstanding debt with OTP Group, we transfer this debt to a third party who handles the collection process. We solicit offers for these receivables and select the one that best aligns with our criteria.
How did your partnership with Fluenta come about?
My role at OTP Group involves overseeing corporate debt collection operations across our international markets. We operate in ten countries: Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia, Moldova, Albania, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, and as of last year, Uzbekistan.
Prior to our current setup, receivables management varied significantly across our domestic and international operations. We had a mix of approaches – some subsidiaries used third-party vendors, others managed the process internally, and there was considerable manual handling involved. This fragmentation prompted us to seek a centralized solution – a single platform where OTP Group could manage receivables sales under standardized conditions across all operations. Fluenta has been our solution for this since 2015.
What made Fluenta stand out as your choice?
Our priority was to implement a system with complete audit trails, secure architecture, and full transparency – essential features for preventing fraud and maintaining proper oversight.
After conducting our market analysis, Fluenta emerged as the clear winner. They distinguished themselves in two key areas: they offered significantly competitive pricing, and more importantly, they proposed a fixed, lump-sum fee structure. This contrasted favorably with their competitors, who typically charge commission-based fees tied to sales volume, making it easier for us to budget and forecast costs.
Another key factor in our decision was Fluenta’s versatility – their system accommodates both direct offer submissions and evaluations, as well as full auction capabilities.
The platform’s multilingual support has proved invaluable. With our diverse international team, having the system available in both Hungarian and English – our primary business language – is essential. They’ve gone even further by offering certain functionalities in our colleagues’ native languages, including Ukrainian, Serbian, and Montenegrin. When we began our partnership, Fluenta was unique in offering this level of language support, while their competitors were primarily focused on serving the Hungarian market.
You implemented Analytics last year. How has it been working for you?
It’s proven to be quite a useful tool. One of its key strengths is the ability to track historical participation in our receivables sales processes – we can see who was invited, their response rate, and the nature of their offers. This insight helps us optimize our vendor pool by identifying patterns, such as participants who consistently receive invitations but never submit bids. In such cases, we can make more informed decisions about future invitations.
We’re still in the early stages of using Analytics, and I believe we’ve only scratched the surface of its capabilities.
How would you rate Fluenta’s customer support?
Our experience has been consistently positive. Based on feedback from our team, the response times are excellent, both in resolving issues and answering queries. Th support team has demonstrated swift and effective responses to every challenge we’ve presented them with.
If you had to give a quick elevator pitch to a colleague from another company about why they should partner with Fluenta, what would you say?
You get a reliable, precise, and transparent system backed by responsive support. And crucially: it’s user-friendly. Despite rarely initiating procedures myself, I can navigate it effortlessly.