STATISTICAL ANALYSIS
FOR THE 12 MONTHS TO 30 JUNE 2011
INTRODUCTION
Overall the quality of statistical returns was much higher than the previous year. Thank you to the
DRs and RRs for ensuring national office only received returns once they were as correct as possible.
HIGHLIGHTS

Total number of client cases is 39,095, up more than 7,600 clients than the previous year.
This is the first time we’ve gone up more than a few thousand in a statistical year for a long
time, and gets us back to 2001 levels.

The number of services providing TMM is 22, up by three services.

The number of community education courses is 1,443, up 350 from the previous year, which
was in turn 423 higher than the previous year.

74% of our clients were getting their primary income from a benefit. This is a 12% leap on
the previous years and may reflect the increase in Work and Income referrals.

The numbers and average hours of paid budget advisers continues to gradually rise,
reflecting a trend towards using paid staff more than volunteers.

Debt arrears presented by clients is $78.7 million, an average of $4,450 per client, and up
from $63 million from last year. This is a $15.6 million increase, compared with increases of
6 million and 9 million in previous years, but the average per client has decreased $458.

Debt arrears retired is $27.7 million, an average of $1,572 per client. This is up from
averages of $1,370, $1,250, and $450 in previous years.

Average debt presented is $428 million, up $13 million on last year, but the average is
$24,480 which is actually lower than last year ($32,600 per client).
ANALYSIS
BUDGET ADVISERS
The number of advisers has increased to 758 from previous lows of 689 in 2005-06. The number of
advisers per service is also picking up slowly. More noticeable is the orange colour in the graph
above: the ratio of paid staff to volunteer staff continues to increase. In 1996-97 it was extremely
rare for a budgeting service to have paid staff – now 39% of staff are paid.
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BUDGETING SERVICES
The number of budgeting services continues to rise slightly from recent years but is still substantially
lower than numbers in the 90s and early 00s.
CLIENTS
The average number of clients per budgeting service has risen markedly which reflects the increase
in client numbers this year coupled with lower numbers of budgeting services than the early 2000s.
As the number of budget advisers gradually recovers, the number of clients have dramatically
increased, resulting in a small but noticeable increase in the average number of clients per adviser
this year.
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CLIENT DEBT
Interestingly, while the total amount of debt has risen to a massive $428 million, the average
presenting debt per client has actually dropped from last year, back to almost the exact same level
as 2008-09. This could have represented the effects of the recession hitting hardest in 2009-10. If
this was true we would also expect higher average debt arrears in 2009-10, which is the case.
The total debt breakdown shows similar trends to last year, with mortgages the biggest creditor
type, followed by finance company loans, bank loans, and debt to government departments.
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DEMOGRAPHICS
This is the first instance since 1998/99 where our members saw more NZ Maori clients than any
other ethnicity. The numbers of Pacific Island clients could be trending upwards slowly, while Asian
and Other remain consistently low. The Asian community in New Zealand accounts for around 9% of
the population so the number of clients identifying as Asian is low. Statistics NZ say 67% of New
Zealanders identify as NZ European, and 14.6% identify as NZ Maori, so our client base is under- and
over-represented, respectively.
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Not surprisingly, the 2010-11 year saw a marked increase in the number of beneficiaries accessing
budgeting services, which will be the result of the Work and Income Future Focus policies being
implemented.
It appears as if we are seeing more and more clients in the 36-45 and 46-65 age brackets, and fewer
in the 18-25 and over 65 age brackets. This could again reflect the trends emerging from the
recession that more ‘middle class’, middle-income earners are finding themselves in financial
trouble. However that does not mesh with the graph above, where salary/wage earners are at the
same level as previous years, so perhaps this is reaching too far to explain a trend.
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0508 BUDGETLINE
The 0508 budget adviser keeps basic statistics on clients who call. These figures are based on 2,113
clients although the total number of calls was higher. Comparison to the national figures shows that
most 0508 clients are younger, and fewer are NZ Maori. Most 0508 clients come via our website, the
Insolvency & Trustee Service, or Work and Income.
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GENERALISED STATEMENTS

Most of our budget advisers are volunteers.
However this trend is reversing, with more and more paid staff.

We have more affiliated budgeting services than recent years.
However this number is much lower than numbers in the 1990s.

Our members experienced a spike in client cases in the 2010-2011 year.
Some of this will be attributable to Future Focus.

Each of our budget advisers see around 40-50 clients per year.
However the majority of clients will be seen by the minority of paid staff, who work longer
hours than volunteers.

The average client presents with $24,477 of debt, of which $4,458 is overdue.
These numbers are down on last year.

The average client retires $1,572 while working with their budget adviser, representing
$27,751,168 in total, annually.
This is a steady upwards trend from previous years.

The total debt presented by clients was $428,171,776 across the country.

Most of our member budgeting service clients are NZ Maori or NZ European.

Most of our member budgeting service clients are beneficiaries.

Our member budgeting services are seeing more clients in the 36-45 and 46-65 age brackets
than they used to.
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