Capita appoints new CFO amid challenging times

Mr Butcher is expected to join the company and the Capita board at the end of the year.

He joins Capita from Go Ahead Group plc where he has been CFO since 2016 and replaces Nick Greatorex, who served as chief financial officer at Capita from March 2015 and will leave at the end of September.

His appointment comes at the most challenging point in Capita’s 34-year history as the firm experiences sliding profits, sales of unwanted divisions as part of a wider restructure, and multiple troublesome contracts.

Capita forged ahead with a heavily discounted right’s issue earlier this year of one billion new shares at 70 pence each – existing shares were trading at 181 pence at the time. This was to help Capita pay down its £1.1bn debt burden.

The company has also offloaded businesses deemed non-core, including Asset Services, the automatic number plate recognition outfit Parking Eye, Supplier Assessment Services, Projen, Medicals Direct Group and Capita Specialist Insurance Services.

Mr Butcher brings to the fray 19 years of experience as a finance director, including six years as group finance director at Network Rail from 2009.

His early career was spent at Deloitte & Touche, where he trained as a Chartered Accountant, and worked across its audit and management consultancy practices.

Capita CEO Jon Lewis said: “I am delighted to welcome Patrick to Capita. He is an accomplished Chief Financial Officer with first class strategic financial management experience developed over 25 years, including 19 years in finance director roles. Patrick is joining Capita at an exciting time. We have de-levered the balance sheet, disposed of non-core assets, started to reduce costs and invest in the business. We are looking forward to adding Patrick’s new perspective, energy and experience to support the good start we have made with our transformation programme and new strategy, delivering the commitments we have made to all our stakeholders.”