Our Team

Hugh Ward
Solicitor

Hugh has worked since 1986 in credit management, debt collection and commercial areas of business and law. He qualified as a Solicitor in Ireland in 1986 and obtained his Juris Doctor Law Degree in the USA in 1991. He is admitted to practice law in Ireland, England, Wales and America and is a member of the bar in the States of New York and District of Columbia.  Read More >>

PS1 Law Society NI

Elaine Goggins
Chief Operations Officer

Elaine Goggins is the Chief Operations Officer of the Ward Group. Elaine has over 20 years’ experience in the debt collection industry. In 2012 she was appointed Operations Director for a multinational credit management business. Previously she had served in a number of other senior management roles with the business. Elaine was awarded Credit Manager of the year in 2011 by the Institute of Credit Managers (IICM) and she also holds AICDP certification in Credit Management. At the Ward Group she manages the full range of administrative, logistical and operational duties in a wide variety of areas including property management procurement, training and client relationship management.

Joe Lenihan
Sales Manager

Joe is an experienced B2B Sales and Relationship Manager with direct experience in Debt Management. He joined the Ward Group in 2014 previously working for one of the largest utilities in Ireland where he had been Head of Sales and Relationship Management for Central Government and Head of Credit Control. Joe is responsible for new customer acquisitions and customer relationship management.

Karen Dowdall
Legal Executive Manager

Karen has excellent experience in Debt Collection both pre legal and legal. She brings both creativity and rigour to the discipline of managing and initiating legal proceedings for our legal recovery caseload. Karen is expert in the management of the teams involved and uses KPI’s to measure and monitor progress on the caseload workflow.

She began her career with a large Debt Collection Company and spent several years managing a team of Collections Agents for a large number of high profile utility and banking clients.

Team Support

The team is made up of various support resources including: solicitors, solicitors trainees, legal executives, paralegals, support staff, cash application executives and legal finance and accounts staff. We also have a nationwide agency network of solicitors which allows us provide service throughout Ireland.