First, we note what signs indicate that a collection agency can be attributed to the best. There is no single criterion that clearly speaks of this. But useful for consideration are the following characteristics when looking for a small business debt collection agency:

Scale of activity

The number of clients - credit organizations, the number of ongoing business, the number of branches, representative offices, regions covered, the presence of an authoritative founder. If the founder is a large credit institution or a school debt collection agency, the agency is guaranteed a large amount of work, it attracts the most qualified personnel, quickly gains experience, is interested in maintaining its image and the image of the founder, which means that employees try to behave very correctly. Another option of a reputable founder is a foreign company with many years of experience in collection activities in other countries and run-in communication technologies with debtors.

Entry into self-regulatory organizations of collectors

Professional associations are always concerned about the reputation of their profession and have high ethical requirements for all participants. Therefore, membership in a reputable self-regulatory organization is one of the indicators of high quality work.

Experience of the company

Every year, the organization gains experience in solving problems develops the most effective and conflict-free technologies for debt repayment.

Company image

It is particularly affected by the feedback of debtors. Companies with significant deficiencies in their work easily fall into the so-called anti-ratings, leading in the number of complaints addressed to them.

Opportunities for remote work with debtors

Most complaints about collectors relate to direct communication between an employee of the agency and the debtor. Remote interaction — for example, through the “Personal Account” of the borrower on the agency’s website, where there is complete information about the state of debt, convenient channels for paying debt, automated discounts for some categories of debtors — can reduce the nervousness of contacts and make them more constructive.

From personal experience, it seems that the best way to find out information about a particular collection agency is through communication within the banking community or contacting competitors on a confidential basis. As a result, it turns out that collection agencies sometimes exaggerate the amount of debts in the work, indicate among the customers banks that transferred one-time lots or, conversely, do not have time to process the borrowed volumes of debt.

Summing up, we can say that the main factor that you need to pay attention to when choosing a collection agency is the volume of services provided. In this case, it is necessary to verify the reality of the declared capabilities, i.e. information and technical equipment, number and training of personnel, etc. Also of great importance in some cases is the regional representation and cost of services. A factor such as efficiency is very difficult to verify before starting work, and the image in some cases differs from reality.

Gradually, potential customers of collectors in order to get the most detailed information, begin not only to analyze the offers of various collection agencies of any type, such as medical debt collection agency, but also to conduct tenders for the provision of collection services. It seems that this is one of the most effective ways to choose a collection agency for cooperation.

Author's Bio: 

Johnny Fortune is an eternal student of life. Always looking for the next big thing in learning and knowledge.