Advice For Debt Collectors Dealing With Debtor Excuses

 

Dur­ing almost every debt col­lec­tion effort, a debt col­lec­tor can expect to hear at least one excuse from a debtor on why pay­ment hasn't been received already. While some­times the debtor is being hon­est in their expla­na­tion, more often than not these excuses are employed as a means of delay­ing the col­lec­tion process in hopes that their account will either be for­got­ten or filed away as uncol­lec­table. It is there­fore the collector's respon­si­bil­ity to sift through the moun­tain of excuses they hear each day and decide what to believe and how to respond. Here are a few of the excuses we've encoun­tered most often, and some tips on what your next step should be.

• Prob­a­bly the sin­gle most widely-used excuse we hear in our col­lec­tion efforts is that, "the check is already in the mail, you should get it soon." While some­times this is true and the check arrives within a few days, more often than not this is an attempt by the debtor to stave off fur­ther col­lec­tion calls for a few days or even weeks. This can be a dif­fi­cult excuse to respond to, as even ask­ing for a pho­to­copy of a check/envelope before it's mailed doesn't nec­es­sar­ily mean the debtor will then mail it. One viable option is to request pay­ment via check-by-phone; at the very least, you'll know the debtor doesn't really intend to pay if they are unwill­ing to pro­vide this type of pay­ment. You can also request a credit card pay­ment, but again a debtor intent on non-payment is likely to come up with another excuse as to why they can­not make the pay­ment over the phone. Unfor­tu­nately, in this case you may be stuck repeat­edly call­ing the debtor in hopes that con­tin­ued pres­sure will even­tu­ally yield results.
• Another com­mon excuse we hear is that a debtor is dis­put­ing the prod­uct or invoice/bill they receive. In this case, you should ask them to explain, in spe­cific detail, the exact nature of their dis­pute. In some cases, these dis­putes are valid and can sig­nif­i­cantly alter the amount owed and the steps that need to be taken next to close the account. You may need to con­tact the cred­i­tor in order to set­tle a dis­pute, but at the least you will be mak­ing progress on the account. If the dis­pute turns out to be invalid, you'll prob­a­bly need to explain the rea­son­ing in detail to the debtor before fur­ther progress can be made in the col­lec­tion effort.
• We often hear from debtors that due to cash-flow trou­bles, they can­not afford to pay at this time. Another vari­a­tion of this excuse is that due to some sort of unfore­seen dis­as­ter (ill­ness, injury, etc.), the busi­ness owner is broke and there­fore can­not pay. The dif­fi­cult eco­nomic sit­u­a­tion of the past four-plus years has thrown many busi­nesses and busi­ness own­ers into seri­ous finan­cial trou­ble, and this excuse for non-payment should be treated with care. Try to find out as much as you can about the business's finan­cial health and ask for an esti­mate of when the owner thinks they'll be able to make a pay­ment. In some cases, you may have to set the account aside for a few months to let them get back on their feet; if the busi­ness and/or busi­ness owner have no money, no amount of phone calls, emails, etc. will result in payment.
• We've heard many times from a receptionist/manager/etc. that, "the boss is out of town/on vaca­tion until xx/xx/20xx and won't be able to sign checks/authorize pay­ments until he's back." Again, as with all of the excuses we hear in our col­lec­tion efforts, this is some­times 100% true: many small busi­ness own­ers have a pol­icy requir­ing their approval on all pay­ments, and they may be the ones who write and sign checks. If they're not in the office, they likely won't be able to make a pay­ment until they're back. How­ever, busi­ness own­ers who are screen­ing calls from debt col­lec­tors may also use this excuse as a way of delay­ing a debt col­lec­tor from con­tact­ing them or avoid­ing pay­ment in a seemingly-legitimate man­ner. You may ask for the boss's email address or other con­tact infor­ma­tion in order to get in touch with him/her and request spe­cial approval or a pay­ment over the phone (by credit card or check). In other cases, you may have to wait until the date he or she is sup­posed to return to the office to try again. If you hear this excuse more than once, how­ever, you should prob­a­bly assume your calls are being screened.

source:.kaplancollectionagency.com