CollectionForum.com Archives


Home \| Forum \| Tell a Friend \| Text Size \| Search \| Member Area

Gain immediate access to all our articles, features, how-to's, discussion group, archives plus. Click here for details.

About this Site
Collection Gurus
Sample Articles
Subscribe Today

Feature Articles
Checklists
Collection Management
Collection Stats
Collection Tips
Construction Credit
Consumer Credit Mgmt
Credit Cards
Credit Mgr's Letter
Credit Procedures
Download Library
FDCPA
Forum
Legal Issues
Member Profiles
Most Popular
Negotiations
Outside the Box
Press Releases
Site Map
Telephone Collection
Tip of the Week

Affiliate Program
Article Index
Contact Us
Help
Tell a Friend
Text Size
Your Account

Books & Special Reports
Product Department

Our Guarantee
Privacy Policy
Terms of Use

Find this here and more!
· Checklists
· Collection Forum
· Downloads
· Templates
· Credit Apps
· Legal info
· Collection Resources
· Collection Strategies
· Discussion Group
· Bankruptcy Strategies
· Much, Much More!

home | Collection Management | Collection Management Archives

Collection Management continued

Displaying Matches 2 thru 16 of 148 Found. BACK NEXT

Pay-As-You-Go Billing--One Utility's Creative Way of Managing Risk
In the vast majority of situations, customers are billed after they've used a product or service. What if you could get customers to pay at the same time or even before they use your product or service? That's exactly what a Canadian utility is doing to keep bad debt down. . . . keep reading

Ten Steps To More Effective Collections
Recently, Connecticut Natural Gas Corporation (ONG), Hartford, Connecticut, a division of Energy East, streamlined its collection effort and significantly decreased write-offs and improved receivables. "I felt we could do a better job collecting money, reducing bad debt and streamlining our internal processes," says Credit and Collection Manager Lucy Davis. "Now we're proactive instead of reactive." On the recommendation of an outside consultant who had reviewed the credit and collection process, the department: . . . keep reading

No-Cost Collections: Too Good to Be True?
I recently received a letter from a collection agency I had never heard of. The letter contained an interesting offer. The company would collect, and it would cost us nothing, zero, zip. Why? Because the collection agency would be paid by the debtor and we would receive 100% of our money. How did this magical process work? The collection agency would charge and demand that the debtor pay interest on the debt from the date the account became past due until the date the claim was paid in full.

Being something of a professional skeptic, I decided to look a bit further at the five-page letter explaining how the program works. There is an expression: "The devil is in the details." The details of this program were as follows: . . . keep reading

Collecting After the Holidays
Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! Happy Holidays! Each year, from Thanksgiving through the New Year, people tend to be in a more festive, optimistic, cheerful, and giving mood. This is all well and good, and it would be nice if the "festive, optimistic, and cheerful" spirit remained year-round. However, the "giving" component, while well intentioned, can come back to bite a lot of people after the first of the year.

"We deal with delinquencies throughout the year, but they become more frequent from December through February," notes an Ohio-based mortgage collection manager, who asked not to be identified. "Historically, January is the month when people start trying to recover from their December spending."

With this understanding, the department implements a concerted effort to keep borrowers on track during these sometimes lean times. "Our goal is to stem the tide of problems in January and February, so that borrowers don't end up as foreclosure candidates later on," he explains. This article looks at their strategy for coping with tougher collections after the holidays; how they support collectors, including extra incentives they offer. . . . keep reading

Too Aggressive Collecting?
A battered veteran of the fiercely competitive computer market, this Credit & Collections Manager friend of ours is an ardent advocate of letting customers know exactly what payment performance is expected and of confronting delinquents immediately. This article details how she handled a complaint from a customer's accounting manager about supposed aggressive and inappropriate collections by one of her collectors. . . . keep reading

Reducing Collector Turnover
Many collection agencies have a difficult time attracting enough collectors just to keep pace with turnover. So what must agencies that are growing rapidly do? What, for example, would an agency do if it landed a contract requiring an additional 30 collectors in the next 30 days?

why this agency restricts hiring to those with experience in collections, and the two things that accomplishes
why they look for collectors with portfolios and what that tells them
what they look for when checking references on their applicants
how they worked with a psychologist to develop an personality skills assessment test
work-related benefits that attract good applicants
a special career track they've developed, including the four levels in that program
how they screen those who seem fit to become managers

. . . keep reading

Improving Call Center Performance
At one time, the collection team at UGI Utilities, Inc. (Reading, Pa.) used to lose between 400 and 500 calls a day (customers hanging up after being on hold for too long). "Now, on a bad day, we rarely even lose 100," reports Alexis Bechtel, supervisor of Central Credit. "Our people are answering about 80% of all calls within 90 seconds."

Moreover, collections employees, who used to answer between four and five calls an hour while spending the rest of their time off-line doing paperwork, are now averaging nine calls an hour. And on average they are collecting 11% of their accounts, almost triple what they did before.

All of these improvements have grown out of a performance measurement program begun as part of the company's Performance Quality Management initiative. Most of the initiative involved a workforce management program that focused on creating RE's (reasonably-expected times to get jobs done).

This article examines their call center's training, improvement teams, written goals and objectives, awards, what types of incentives they offer, and the how, when, and what of their monthly meetings. . . . keep reading

Putting a Wrench in Delinquent Customers' "Systems"
One Nebraska credit manager (who has asked to remain anonymous) splits up collection calls with her assistant. Each takes one half of the delinquents . . . keep reading

Customizing Collection Strategies on Business Credit Cards
Business credit card issuers deal with a wide variety of businesses in diverse industries. Furthermore, some of these businesses may be relatively new while others may be seasonal, either of which present specific challenges. So the same collection strategy doesn't work for all. That's why Advanta Bancorp. (Spring House, Pa.), an affiliate of Advanta Corporation, diversifies its collection strategies to match cardholders' businesses.

what resources Advanta uses to determines what part of its lifecycle a business is in
When the late fee is charged
How delinquencies are measured according to risk and what collection strategies they use depending on the risk
variables used by their call center predictive dialers
strategies used to script calls

. . . keep reading

A Bonus Plan for Collectors
A veteran of 23 years in credit work, Dorothy Siegel has spent the last nine years as credit manager of Fast Memory, Inc. She is a member of the southern California chapter of the NACM, and her specialty is reconciliation of major accounts 120 days or more past due. This "Point of View" column by Dorothy looks at how she structured a bonus system to incentivize collectors to tackle their older past due items that were oustanding because of pricing errors, duplicate shipments, incorrect purchase orders, or other disputes.

How large the bonuses are
What the results of the program have been
What the risks are, but what control mechanisms she put in place to mitigate those risks

. . . keep reading

Collections -- The Human Side
"Credit professionals must be 'people' people," insists Kathleen Tomlin, CCE, credit manager at Kaiser Cement Corp. (Pleasanton, Calif.). "You have to realize that when you're calling a customer for money, you're not talking to a company, an account, or a statistic. You're talking to a real person--just like you. You're asking that real person to cut you a check and mail it to you."

what techniques Tomlin uses to develop a good personal relationship with her customers
a little, but much appreciated, gift that Tomlin brings with her when visiting customers

. . . keep reading

Collection Training: Do You "Revisit?"
As a manager, you probably remember at least one orientation program during your career where you were just literally overwhelmed with information--so much so that you simply couldn't assimilate it. . . . keep reading

Credit & Collection Managers closely watch the sluggish U.S. Economy
November 22, 2010

Woodland Hills, CA -- With the national employment rate stuck at 9.6 percent (14.8 unemployed Americans) and the U.S economy growing at an anemic two percent annual rate in the third quarter, Caine & Weiner, an international provider of accounts receivable management solutions, surveyed businesses in every major industry to determine how the uncertain economy was affecting their cash flow. . . . keep reading

Comprehensive Collector Training
While high turnover and low productivity plague much of the collection industry, the reverse is true at Remit Corporation (Bloomsburg, PA). The reason? "Our collectors enjoy what they do," replies Harry Strausser, III, president.

And a key reason Remit collectors enjoy their jobs is the fact that they have been extremely well trained to do them. As a certified trainer for the American Collectors Association (ACA), Strausser has the opportunity to travel around the country and help train collection agencies in how to effectively train their collectors. "I've come to the conclusion that one of the major causes of high turnover in our industry is the fact that collectors are not adequately prepared for their jobs through training," he says. Just a few items covered in this article include...

The six topics that should be addressed in introductory training
The secret to keeping their collectors motivated on the job and enthusiastic about each call

. . . keep reading

The Value of Collection Training
"Society is taking an ever dimmer view of collection agencies 'spilling the beans' to third parties," notes Margaret Haynes, executive vice president of the Professional School of Collections (Phoenix, AZ) and a 25-year veteran in the profession.

Lack of familiarity with the laws related to collections, especially the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), is one glaring adverse consequence of inadequate collector training. And Haynes insists there are others as well: . . . keep reading

Displaying Matches 2 thru 16 of 148 Found BACK NEXT

Advanced Search

Recent Forum Posts

• good interview Qs for hiring collectors?

• Metrics for in-house Collectors?

• Caller ID in collections?

• Missing one of the "Seven Key Traits of Top Collectors" - Is that an Achilles' Heal for Collectors?

• Receivable Meeting format?

• When to place accounts for collection?

• Collection Settlements

Here's what our members are saying ...

"What a great resource! This is the perfect place to refer our customers who have collection problems so they can improve their collections. I figure if we can help them collect faster, they can pay us faster and order more product."

William C. Edgar, CCE
Director of Credit
Zippo Manufacturing

"I can't believe I didn't find out about your site sooner."

"It was exactly what I was looking for."

Jim P.
Hot Springs, AR

"The first item I found in your download library made my subscription worthwhile. I'm definitely renewing!"

John A.
Kerrville, TX

"Your site saved the day for me. The video tutorial helped me quickly and solve a problem I've been struggling with for a year.

Robert K.
London, UK

"I can't say enough about how valuable your site has been to our business. The articles and especially the free downloads really are great."

Victor O.
Seattle, WA