ASSESSING THE IMPACTS OF MARKET FIRES ON THE PERFORMANCE OF SAVINGS AND LOANS COMPANIES IN GHANA: THE CASE OF FIRST ALLIED SAVINGS AND LOANS LIMITED

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Date
July 2015
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Abstract
Ghana has in recent years witnessed frequent outbreaks of fire in the various market centers. Unfortunately, each occurrence of fire outbreak impacts negatively on traders who fall victims and the performance of banks, particularly savings and loans companies which have most of their loan customers in the market centres. This phenomenon of market fire outbreaks have created a situation where savings and loans companies are confronted with the challenge of having to deal with huge amount of non-performing loans. The study administered questionnaire to sixty-seven credits officers and twenty customers of First Allied Savings and Loans Limited (FASL) as well as an interview session with the assistant credits manager to collect primary data. It was found out that market fires have become one of the causes of loan default in FASL and account for 15% of all the causes of loan defaults. Again, it was found out that GHS500, 000.00 has been written-off as bad loan as a result market fire outbreaks. Another finding of the study is that 50% of customers who responded to the questionnaire still have huge outstanding loan amounts they are struggling to pay due to market fires. In order to reduce the effects of market fire outbreaks, it has been recommended that the central government must resource the Ghana National Fire Service with more fire fighting vehicles and equipment. Also, the government has been advised to reconstruct all old markets to make them more accessible and equip all such markets with fire hydrants. Again it is recommended that the Ghana National Fire Service must on regular basis educate traders at the various market centers on fire safety measures.
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A Thesis submitted to the Department of Accounting and Finance, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Business Administration (Accounting Option)
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