My Journey With Yorkshire Payments – 10 Year Anniversary

My Journey With Yorkshire Payments - By Sophie Williams

As part of our anniversary celebration we asked our team to write a short piece about the company. Sophie, our Applications Manager is also celebrating her ten year work anniversary. So we checked in with her to see what she had to say about her 10 years working with Yorkshire Payments and how it all started. 

"I have loved seeing the business grow and I’m thankful for the opportunities I have been given, I have gained great knowledge within the industry and the business has supported me and allowed me to expand my qualifications."
My Journey with Yorkshire Payments

I started at Yorkshire Payments as an apprentice in October. 2013). I was very grateful for the opportunity James Howard (Managing Director) gave to me when he offered me the job. Back then it was extremely difficult to find work when leaving school due to having no work experience. I completed my NVQ level 2 business and administration apprenticeship and then continued to do various other courses to expand my knowledge and skills.

At the time, the business was only small with a few other people working there so I was given the opportunity to take on a lot of responsibilities quite quickly which I don’t think I would have been given elsewhere.

In my first week of working at Yorkshire Payments I was invited on a works trip to visit one of our acquiring banks I was so nervous but was so glad I was able to experience that so young as I realised this was a job I wanted to progress within.

Each year after, James recruited a new apprentice to give a young person the opportunity to build a career and help develop their skills. They were all offered permanent roles within the business afterwards.

I have loved seeing the business grow and I’m thankful for the opportunities I have been given, I have gained great knowledge within the industry and the business has supported me and allowed me to expand my qualifications. I’ve completed numerous courses throughout the years including my NVQ level 2 customer service, NVQ level 3 team leader/supervisor and I am halfway through completing my NVQ level 5 in operational / department manager course.

I have been able to progress in my career over the years at Yorkshire payments starting off as an apprentice to becoming an Applications Manager. I started working here when I was 17, I have watched the business go through many changes, challenges and achievements, including winning multiple awards. We’ve grown and expanded and moved offices multiple times due to increased staff. We are now based in a lovely building in Brighouse town centre.

The best thing I love about Yorkshire payments is the loyal staff. Everyone cares about doing a good job. I have worked with Vikki Oakley (HR Director) from more or less the beginning. We both started with no experience in the industry but have been able to learn and progress within our careers. Without Vikki the business wouldn’t be as fun and enjoyable to work at. She’s always thinking of staff events and ways to keep the office morale high as well as dealing with her day-to-day role as a Director.

Years later, I’ve now have had a beautiful baby girl and I’m enjoying spending time being a new mum! I look forward to learning new skills within the forever changing industry and hopefully to continue to progress within my career when I return from maternity leave.

Cheers to 10 years of YP 🥂

Sophie and MD James Howard

Share This Article

Stay Connected

More Posts

Stay In The Loop

Sign up to our newsletter to keep up to date with our news and updates.

Outage warning

We have been advised of an outage affecting all customers using Verifone termianls

This is currently under investigation .

We will update as more information becomes available.

Please retry using your service every 30 minutes. 

– Yorkshire Payments Support Team.