FECECAV has made one of its two most recent quarterly payments due to Kiva lenders, however they are still behind in repaying the full amount agreed upon in their promissory note with Kiva. Our team is in contact with the organization and will continue to follow up to collect scheduled payments.

Status Update - November 20, 2012

FECECAV has not made its recent quarterly payment and is in violation of its promissory note with Kiva. Our team is in contact with the organization and will continue to follow up to collect scheduled payments.

Status Update - September 10, 2012

FECECAV has been making quarterly payments to Kiva in accordance with a promissory note agreed upon in August 2011. Kiva recently received the $20,000 payment for Q2 2012, and FECECAV is on schedule to pay off the rest of its outstanding balance by June 2014.

Status Update - May 29, 2012

FECECAV just paid Kiva its $20,000 first-quarter installment on its outstanding balance. The organization will be in compliance with the terms of its promissory note for the next month.

Status Update - April 17, 2012

FECECAV continues to pay back the amount owed at a rate of about $20,000 per quarter in accordance with its promissory note. While Kiva expects full repayment of the outstanding balance, payments have fallen about three months behind. The most recent installment was received on March 31 and will be distributed to lenders. Kiva is currently taking measures to expedite repayment. No new loans from FECECAV will be posted to the site until further notice. 

Status Update - October 14, 2011:

Following a recent review of FECECAV's financial and operational situation, Kiva negotiated a promissory note with FECECAV to formally reschedule the remainder of its outstanding funds with Kiva lenders.  The promissory note re-structures FECECAV's repayment schedule for the remaining $226,405.11 outstanding, to quarterly repayments, and was agreed upon with the goal of maximizing the recovery of outstanding funds to Kiva lenders. 

FECECAV is not currently able to pay back all of the funds due to Kiva lenders on the original repayment schedule, as a result of liquidity shortages, operational restructuring and funding gaps.  The new repayment schedule is designed to help allow FECECAV to keep their organization up and running, so that they can generate enough cash to pay back the Kiva lender community over time.  According to the terms of the new promissory note, Kiva lenders should expect repayments once per quarter (beginning in October 2011), until the total value of their outstanding debt has been repaid.  As payments are received, they will be distributed on a pro-rata basis to all affected lenders. The reason for pro-rata distribution is that FECECAV is unable to accurately report repayments to Kiva on a loan-by-loan basis.

FECECAV has reported to Kiva that they are investing in operational and financial improvements for their organization.  In early October, FECECAV made its first repayment of $19,643.27.  These funds will be distributed pro-rata to lenders beginning October 15, and will further serve to decrease FECECAV's delinquency rate as expressed on the Kiva website.

Status update - June 7, 2011:

FECECAV has $233,487 in loans on Kiva currently in arrears out of a total outstanding portfolio of $239,250. As a result, its delinquency rate as expressed on the Kiva website is currently 97.59%.

Kiva is continuing to work to recover lenders funds.  In addition to the $20,340.35 collected in February, Kiva collected $6,381.93 in April and an additional $6,361.56 in May, for a total of $33,083.84 in funds collected this calendar year.

Funds distributed to Kiva lenders since January 28, 2011 have been and will continue to be allocated on a pro-rata basis: as repayments come in, the funds are paid out to Kiva lender accounts based on the percentage of total loans outstanding.

We will keep this page updated with further updates as information becomes available.

Status Update - March 14, 2011

FECECAV is paying back the amount owed in accordance with its promissory note. Kiva received the most recent installment, totalinng $19,773.75 on March 9. This credit will be distributed to lenders' accounts. 

Status update - February 14, 2011: 

In recent days, Kiva has collected an additional $20,340.35 from FECECAV. As mentioned earlier, these funds will be distributed pro-rata to lenders beginning on the 15th of this month, and will further serve to decrease FECECAV's delinquency rate as expressed on the Kiva website.

Status update - January 28, 2011:

FECECAV has $236,646 in loans on Kiva currently in arrears out of a total outstanding portfolio of $307,102. As a result, its delinquency rate as expressed on the Kiva website is currently 77.06%. 

As indicated by this delinquency rate, FECECAV is currently overdue in remitting funds to Kiva. Over the past few months, FECECAV has made $44,147 in payments to Kiva. Normally, Kiva lenders who have lent to FECECAV borrowers would have their accounts credited with the amount that such Kiva lender’s borrowers have actually paid back to FECECAV. However, due to operational challenges at this field partner, it was not possible to generate accurate repayment reports on the amount collected for each Kiva Loan. This situation makes it difficult for Kiva to know the true amounts collected on each Kiva loan.

Because of this, Kiva made the decision to hold the $44,147 in funds received from FECECAV in reserve until we could determine whether or not it was possible to get accurate data on the precise repayments made from borrowers to FECECAV. Upon deeper investigation, we have concluded that FECECAV is unable to accurately report on a loan-by-loan basis or make full repayments for all Kiva loans at this time. As such, Kiva has made the decision to credit all lenders to FECECAV on a pro-rata basis: as repayments come in, funds will paid out to Kiva lender accounts based on the percentage of total loans outstanding.

The funds from FECECAV were released from reserve today, causing FECECAV's delinquency rate to fall. As we receive further payments from FECECAV, we will continue to pay them out to Kiva lender accounts on a pro-rated basis. Further, FECECAV will remain paused from posting new profiles and accepting new loans from the Kiva website.

We will keep this page updated with further updates as information becomes available. 

Status update - December 9, 2010:

As mentioned in our July 2010 update, a Kiva staff member recently made an on-site visit to FECECAV. The purpose of the visit was to further investigate the financial and operational information that led our risk management team to lower FECECAV’s star rating on the Kiva website. Their management was very receptive to our visit and shared information with Kiva’s analysts in an open and transparent manner.

During the visit, we were able to further understand FECECAV’s challenges. A recent increase in borrower delinquency has helped create a cashflow shortage that has hindered FECECAV's ability to repay Kiva lenders in a timely manner. This has been caused in part by Togo's presidential elections, held in March 2010. Because the last presidential election led to widespread social and political unrest, many borrowers withdrew their savings and temporarily moved away from their homes in anticipation of repeated unrest. This has caused a number of the borrowers who moved away to fall delinquent on their repayments.

These borrower delinquencies — along with the aforementioned increase in savings withdrawals — have had a significant impact on the organization's cash flows. This has caused liquidity to be tight. In addition, a disbursement from a recently secured credit line has been delayed for a number of months. As a result of these factors, FECECAV has struggled to make on-time repayments to Kiva and its lenders. This has resulted in an increase in FECECAV's reported delinquency rate, as expressed on the Kiva website.

Over the past few months, our analysts have been working closely with FECECAV as well as their other funders to monitor the situation and ensure that Kiva lenders are treated on an equal basis with FECECAV’s other creditors. We will continue to manage this situation and will post updates to this page as this situation progresses.

Status update - July 20, 2010

As mentioned in our September 2009 update, Kiva sent a Fellow over to Togo in late 2009 to perform further investigation on Fececav's adherence to Kiva's policies on loan posting. In addition, in May/June of 2010 a Field Support Specialist also visited Fececav.

Since then, Fececav has contacted Kiva to request a pause in posting new profiles to the Kiva website as they wanted to focus on their core operations (lending and collections) instead of continuing to create new profiles for the Kiva website. Because of this, no new profiles have been uploaded to Kiva from Fececav since June 2010.

Kiva began a dialogue with Fececav to better understand the reasons behind their request for a pause. During this discussion, Fececav shared recent financial and operational monitoring data with our analysts. The data that we gathered has led us to believe that Fececav's initial Kiva Risk Rating (4 out of 5) may no longer be appropriate given the level of risk in their updated financial and operational data. As such, we have reduced their risk rating from 4 to 2 stars.

In the meantime, we will maintain the pause in the relationship with Fececav. In addition, Kiva staff members will be following up with an on-site visit to Fececav's offices in the coming months to learn more. 

Status update - September 21, 2009:

In June 2009, while preparing visits to Kiva borrowers, a Kiva Fellow uncovered significant discrepancies in the loan amounts and terms posted by FECECAV. In violation of Kiva’s policies, the person in charge of submitting loans to the website regularly increased or reduced loan amounts and changed disbursement dates in order to quickly meet monthly fundraising targets.

The problem stemmed from lack of oversight rather than any deliberate intention of defrauding Kiva, and FECECAV has taken several steps to correct the issue. A new Kiva Coordinator position was created within the organization to minimize conflicts of interest, and the person has been hired and trained with the help of the Kiva Fellow. FECECAV is additionally taking steps to improve its loan tracking system and is requiring that loan officers, branch managers, and the Kiva Coordinator all attest to the accuracy of the data before a profile is submitted to Kiva. Finally, the Executive Director has committed to a monthly audit of five profiles as well as improved journaling in order to regularly verify the information submitted to Kiva.

We will be working closely with FECECAV over the next few months to monitor the situation. We are also sending a new Kiva Fellow to the organization in October in order to provide additional support for improving and strengthening the Kiva process at FECECAV. We trust that the steps taken have corrected the problem and will keep you updated on any new developments.
 

Partner Description:

FECECAV is a cooperative union created in 1995 and registered in 1997. It's mission is to serve the financial needs of local people who have been excluded from the traditional financial system. It serves more than 10,000 members in the Plateaux and Maritime regions of Togo. FECECAV is a non-profit organization.