By The Intelitech Group
Most people don’t think I want to be a debt collector when I grow up. But despite its lack of glamour, it has ended up being a rewarding career and industry for the many who end up in debt collections (myself included).
However, even with all the progress in collector hiring and training in our industry, there remains one universally challenging component of collecting debt – keeping your head up while having difficult interactions and staying positive when the stakes are high.
And we all know, truly successful collectors are able to provide a high level of customer service with some passion and caring behind it. But occasionally, that high passion can result in high frustration. And that frustration can create negative attitudes and interactions.
Data Enrichment Empowers Collectors
In addition to hiring practices and training programs, some of our clients are beginning to see the impact data enrichment and more comprehensive propensity scoring has on overall collector positivity.
Today, if your collectors are spending energy equally across accounts, they are going to inevitably spin their wheels with some accounts that are unlikely to yield a return for your business and your clients. Traditional data enrichment and scoring models look at contact information and consumer attributes and attempt to produce a propensity score that agencies may use to prioritize and educate collectors; however, when looking at ROI, many of those scores fall short by not using history on that specific account and information about the debt being collected to tell a more comprehensive story to a collector. If your collectors can’t trust the scoring and data available to them because account type and history tell a different story, does it really influence how they approach the consumer?
Predicting an ability to pay is a small portion of the solution. You also need to consider the type and amount of debt and historical interactions with your agency.
By knowing the ability to pay ahead of time, collectors are better armed with an approach that isn’t frustrating for them or the consumer. When a collector knows they are contacting an account that is unlikely to pay, and is not as profitable to the business or their own paycheck, they avoid overinvesting energy and are able to stay positive instead of getting frustrated with one account and carrying that over to an account that would be more likely to pay. Less rejection and more payments collected equals a happy collector.
One of our valued clients, Paul Rymer at National Healthcare Collections, recently told us,
“Our calls, attitude, and demeanor are completely different with strategic prioritization through advanced propensity scoring models from Intelitech. Without this prioritization strategy, it is very easy to get pulled into a negative mindset when dealing with an abrasive account. Then, without intention, the negative mindset carries over but this account happens to be a high balance and high likelihood of payment. This knowledge is of huge value in keeping the attitude of the collector department in a positive mindset, which is what all business owners want.”
To see the full results achieved at National Healthcare Collections, check out this Ultimate Analytics Case Study.
If you’re interested in gaining an outside perspective on how your data strategy and scoring models may or may not be effective, reach out to us.
