Global Custodian has today opened its Prime Brokerage survey as a ‘soft’ launch, allowing participants to engage now or to wait until client relations return to something approaching normality.
GC will also implement a ‘soft’ launch approach to its upcoming Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) administration, which is scheduled to go live on Monday 6th April.
“Clearly, the current environment, where people are adapting to home-working while doing their best to mitigate health risks to themselves, their families and colleagues, is not conducive to business as usual when it comes to our survey processes,” said Richard Schwartz, special projects editor, Global Custodian.
“As both rated providers and respondents are aware, our traditional approach is to launch a survey, invite providers to compile a list of clients to respond to it as well as giving respondents from the previous year the opportunity to re-engage.”
Many service providers will make a concerted effort to encourage their clients to complete a survey within the specified time to ensure that they receive sufficient responses for analysis.
“On the one hand, some participants see current working conditions as conducive to spending time engaging in online questionnaires,” said Schwartz. “Anecdotal evidence from survey platforms suggests that there has been an uptick in such activity recently. On the other, many firms feel understandably that this is not a time to be calling on their clients for anything other than to offer support as they grapple to adjust.”
The magazine has therefore adopted a policy whereby surveys that are already live will remain open for completion, but closing dates will be revised as the situation becomes clearer. New surveys will, meanwhile, be opened on a ‘soft launch’ basis.
“This will allow participants who are stuck at home and going stir crazy to distract themselves temporarily by engaging with the relevant survey,” added Schwartz. “It will also allow providers to get a feel for the new surveys, which have been significantly revamped for ease of completion. We will not, however, be asking rated providers to ramp up their effort until things return to something approaching normality and they feel comfortable approaching their clients to participate.”