Our impact on the environment

Vanquis Banking Group is committed to conducting its business in a manner that minimises its impact on the environment. We recognise the importance of acting on climate change, as it poses a significant risk to the global economy and to society in general. By managing our day-to-day business operations in an efficient and responsible manner, we can reduce both our direct and indirect impacts on the planet.

The Vanquis Banking Group Environmental Policy sets out the requirements to control and mitigate the environmental risk within the group’s businesses. This includes risks that are associated with the direct impacts of energy and resource consumption, as well as the indirect impacts of our procurement processes and lending activities. This is good practice and is an important facet of being a responsible and sustainable financial services provider.

The scope of this policy applies to all Divisions.

At a minimum, this policy requires that the Vanquis Banking Group meet or exceeds the requirements of all relevant environmental legislation, regulations and/or approved codes of practice in each country in which they operate.

This policy also commits the Group and its Divisions to:

• Operate a continuous improvement programme which aims to reduce the Group’s consumption of resources (e.g. energy, fuel, paper and water) and increase the efficiency of the use of these resources. This will include establishing objectives and targets to measure environmental performance and subsequently to evaluate, on at least a bi-annual basis, whether such objectives and targets have been met and how further improvements in environmental performance could be achieved.
• Where practicable, avoid or minimise the use of hazardous or toxic material or products, and preventing pollution from their operations and facilities.
• Integrate environmental considerations into procurement processes for goods and services and encourage our suppliers and business partners, to adopt good environmental practices and where appropriate, collaborate with them on solutions to mitigate our impacts on the environment.
• Reduce greenhouse gas emissions from our direct operations by investing in sustainable buildings and technology, implementing energy efficient technologies and managing our business travel activities.
• Raise colleague awareness of environmental issues and encourage them to adopt environmentally responsible behaviour to enable them to play a meaningful role in implementing this policy.
• Ensure that this policy is brought to the attention of all employees and to third parties who work for the Group, as appropriate. Report annually on their environmental performance to the Group Head of Sustainability and to their divisional environmental working group. This information will be monitored and published externally in the Annual Report & Financial Statements and in the annual Corporate Responsibility Report and on the corporate website.