The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

The Bahamas Institute of Financial Services (BIFS) executive director yesterday said she was “encouraged” by the number of professionals seeking to upgrade their skills during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kim Bodie, told Tribune Business: “We are most encouraged with the response that we are still getting from persons in the financial services sector in upskilling themselves. I'm grateful, and I must commend them, for their resilience and their ability at this particular time because there's so many people complaining.

“After the success we have had with our online platform we may not go back to in-person classes any more. We cater to a lot of working professionals who have to work, and don’t have a lot of time to leave their offices, so this is something that we have considered as the interest level has not dropped in our courses. For these people to be able to settle down at 6pm and go online and take their classes has been beneficial to them.”

Ms Bodie said the Institute has been catering mostly to existing financial services workers rather than new persons seeking to enter the industry. She added that the most popular courses are the “speciality certifications” such as trusts; anti-money laundering; compliance and risk certification.

"We have the entry level and the diploma level," she added. "We see those are just trickling along with persons, the more mature individuals in the industry, wanting to keep themselves abreast with the amendments; the new laws related to financial services. So we see them coming in for those courses."

Ms Bodie said the Institute has seen “steady enrolment” since last March, while the usual “dead periods” are now filled by persons signing up. She said: “I can tell you that we have more than ten, sometimes up to 15, almost 20 students per specialty core.

“For the past two years it has been like that and we have not had any drastic change. You would think that during this time you would see a significant drop, but we have not seen a significant drop. Based on our numbers from previous years, we haven't seen any significant drop.”

Ms Bodie said the Parliament's continued passage of new financial services legislation, plus changes to existing laws, has provided the impetus for persons to keep abreast of the latest developments. She added: “Some people see a need to educate themselves, so they find the funds to come to BIFS.”