Corporate Social Responsibility

Group volunteering

• Cabot Financial UK has met the target to increase volunteering community days from 170 in 2018 to 500 days for the Kings Hill site in 2019
• In Hull, Wescot has participated in local Enterprise Partnership Scheme – providing HR mentoring to a local secondary school
• In Spain we has made donations of 50 screens and 20 computers to AFANIAS (For its Schools and Professional Training Centers for people with intellectual disability).
• Cabot Financial Ireland, collected items that a local women’s shelter required.
• Cabot Financial including our Worthing office and our law firm Mortimer Clarke Solicitors is working with all three shortlisted charities Porchlight, Demelza and Young Lives Foundation throughout 2020.

Group Environmental sustainability

• Cabot Financial UK, Kings Hill office is now entirely powered by renewable energy.
• Wescot in Hull additional Multifunction devices installed replacing desktop printers, all with print management reducing unnecessary printing and paper waste and greater cartridge capacity. 
• Cabot Financial Spain, has had renewal of ISO 14001, certification on environmental management system implemented, this incorporates many initiatives such as paper reduction and LED lighting.
• In France, has a recycling scheme with the union representatives for paper on premises. 
• In the UK, Cabot Financial has removed plastic cups from Kings Hill offices with an estimated saving of 120,000 single use plastics per year.
• In the UK, we have introduced car share arrangements saving 200,000 miles driven per year, equating to 9,100 gallons of petrol and 27 million grams of CO2

Group Diversity and Inclusion

• Cabot Financial UK, creating an annual calendar of events for cultural, religious and other identified days.
• Looking at Unconscious bias practical embedding our parent company Encore use. 
• Wescot is rolling out a Diversity and Inclusion policy across its site and dlc.
• Wescot has achieved a Gender Pay Gap of zero. 
• Cabot Financial Spain trained a total of 60 employees throughout 2019; achieving an internal goal of having all Execs, Sr Managers, MP2s and MP1s initiated on the D&I conversation.
• Cabot Financial Ireland has incorporated unconscious bias training for all hiring managers.

Skills4bills overview

The aim of the game is to provide students with an awareness of the financial commitments and decisions they will face during their lives, and to help make the students aware of the consequences of finding themselves in debt. It is aimed at Key Stage 2 students and is an experiential way of teaching them money skills.
Our hope is that the game helps to develop an understanding of the financial and economic dimensions of life and fosters a sense of personal responsibility when dealing with financial affairs.

The students who have played Skills 4 Bills™ so far at various primary schools in the Midlands and Kent have taken some very valuable skills away and have also thoroughly enjoyed playing the game. The initiative does not cost the schools anything and is run by our wonderful team of employees who get great benefit from interacting with the students and sharing their knowledge and experience.

For more information

Hitting the spot for the curriculum

After playing Skills 4 Bills™, Key Stage 2 students will:

• Begin to understand the concept of credit
• Recognise household expenses and regular financial commitments
• Understand keeping money safe by putting it into an account
• Understand that they may need to save if there isn’t enough money for everything they want to buy
• Begin to be able to plan and think ahead
• Learn how to prioritise when there is a limited supply of money
• Understand the difference between good debt (planned and manageable) and bad debt (unplanned or unmanageable)
• Learn that their decisions can have individual, social and environmental consequences
• Understand the benefits of saving by learning how to look after money
• Develop an understanding that financial circumstances and standards of living can vary across time and place.
• Learn numeracy skills
• Learn how to negotiate

How the game works

• Resources required – 9 tables with chairs set in a horseshoe formation and 12 people to run the game
• Duration – approximately 90 minutes (but this is flexible depending on student participation).

1. Each student is allocated a job sheet which includes the qualifications required and the relevant salary.
2. They go to each table in turn, most of which are compulsory, starting with the taxman.
3. They then have the opportunity to purchase accommodation with associated living costs, transport, holiday and entertainment. This also includes an “Events” desk where they may be allocated a hidden expense or receive a bonus of some form.
4. At the Accountant’s desk, their monthly spend is totalled and if they are in debt, they have a monthly payment plan set up. If they are in credit, this money is added on to the salary for the next month.
5. They then play the game for a second time but this time keeping a track of their balance as
   they go round.
6. Discussions take place with the students at the end of each round on how to manage their money and to encourage saving