Debt Recovery

Running a Small Business can be quite overwhelming, often causing stress, burnout and anxiety. Although employees may also experience stress, but for the owner this pressure can be brutal.

American Psychological Association estimates that the U.S. economy loses more than $500 billion due to workplace stress and also increases the health insurance costs, impacting Small Businesses dearly. Managing stress is important for taking right business decisions and maintaining a good personal health.

Even I have personally gone through the whole start-up business cycle and often face the complications of managing a small business. After being in a fairly stable and well paying jobs for about 20 years, I quit my last job and ventured on my own. This portal is a part of that same Small Business. Burning through my savings during the startup mode, then taking new initiatives/risks to further grow the business, hiring and retaining the right talent, carefully planning every financial decision, competition, extensively researching and partnering with good collection agencies to serve businesses like yours, all this takes time and a personal toll. But self-motivation, ability to controlling the stress and reminding myself that the success takes its own sweet time has kept me going fairly good. Receiving complements from satisfied customers is personally the biggest stress buster for me.

Managing the stress while running the a Small Business requires positive thinking, financial planning and lifestyle changes.

Positive Thinking:
Having a bad week or complications regarding fulfillment of an order? These issues often push frustrations and negative thoughts in our brain. It happens with everyone, but it also prepares us for the tough times.

Simply recollect those ambitious thoughts when you had started this business business and all the nice changes it can bring to your life. We need to constantly harness the power that comes out of positive thinking. Maintain a healthy environment like keeping your desk clean and organized. Are you surrounded by negative and lazy people, then take appropriate action?

Managing Finances / Budgeting:
Growth and expenses are like two ends of a rope with your brain in the center. Each of them pulling your brain towards itself. Faster growth could erode finances too fast, being too conservative could halt your growth.

Managing finances is by far the biggest challenge for all Small Businesses and one of the biggest cause of stress. To balance your growth trajectory, have a well written plan and stick to it. Have a fairly good reason to alter your plan. Do not take adhoc financial decisions. Before you take a crucial decision give your sufficient brain time to rethink it. Often an idea which sounds too at a moment, seems to be “so-so” after a day.

Keeping your Head Cool:
Outbursts can only do harm, then cannot undo what has already happened. Not meeting a target does not mean you need to get terribly upset on an employee, client, vendor or even with yourself. Think practically, we all are humans and mistakes do happen. Why was the target not achieved, it’s possible that you are being extremely bullish for a task that needs more time and resources. When things go wrong, keep your head cool and see how things could have been done differently. Learn to let go things.

Success takes time:
It’s completely normal to become restless even though you may have been putting your entire energy and time into your small business. Success takes its own sweet time. May be you are missing out on a introducing a feature that would make you stand apart from your competitors. 

Keep Watching your Accomplishments too:
Constantly focusing on things that are going wrong will obviously increase your stress by many folds. Regardless it’s “Big or Small”, list all your accomplishments and milestones that you have achieved successfully and place them on your wall. It will give you motivation, positivity and satisfaction. 

Make a list and Prioritize your tasks:
Getting overwhelmed with too many tasks? The best way is to write all them in the order of priority, alongwith an expected date of completion. Many people have a white board marker in their office labeled as “Tasks to do“. I personally prefer using a “Notepad” App on my cell-phone. That “Work-to-do” list is always with me, and I can make alterations pretty much anytime-anywhere. If I need to share it with a team member I simply “Email/WhatsApp” them.

I even have “New-Ideas” list, that I keep evaluating every now and then, but I land up deleting 95% of those newly added ideas a few days later after thinking them through.

Take a Short Refreshing Break:
To prevent burnout, it is important to take short breaks. This could be as simple as going for a short walk, taking a coffee break, checking the weather outside, calling a friend, watching a video, quick stretches, a quick meditation session or even going to a nearby 7-11 store to buy a $1 lottery ticket. These short breaks are really refreshing and energizing. Force yourself not to think about your work. Your burnout level will drop significantly.

Take Care of the Most Important Asset – You!
Yes, you are the biggest asset of your business. A Small Business owner has to take critical decisions, perform or supervise tasks, pretty much everything.

Eat on time, exercise regularly, release your anxieties and frustrations. Money is often too expensive, it can take away your health. If you feel lonely, party over the weekend with your friends. Hit the gym, or swim, have a life beyond work. Productivity increases if the stress decreases.

You don’t have to say “Yes” to everything:
Small Business owners are often over-used by their clients. Those never ending small requests eating up too much of your time? can’t say “No” due to the fear of losing them? Indeed, we do need to fulfill several of these extra demands, but if those list of demands never end or become quite unreasonable, have the courage to say “No”, backed by a solid reason. Well, unless they are ready to pay for the extra cost involved.

Outsource your Accounts Receivables to a Collection Agency:
Recovering money from clients who refuse on pay on time can be really frustrating. It can eventually lead you to writing those off as a complete loss in the accounting books.

Creating systems for common tasks such as recovering money from accounts over 60-90 days past due by involving a professional Debt Collection Agency. It will not only help you to recover some of that lost money but drastically reduce your stress and of your employees.

Developing systems also means you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time you get a new client or launch a new product.

A low amount of stress is probably fine and may even motivate us to work hard, but an elevated level of stress can actually hurt you. If you do not know how to do something, get in touch with somebody who does.

There are thousands of collection agencies in America, but a vast majority of consumer collection agencies do not provide nationwide service. Licenses are required in almost 33 states for consumer collections and some cities like New York City even have their own licensing standards for agencies operating within the city limits. Each state has its own license requirements and procedure. Some states require a physical office or a key employee in their state to be registered.

Broadly speaking, when this article was written, these states did not require consumer debt collectors to be licensed – Kansas, Louisiana, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, California, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New York, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Vermont and Virginia.

Since the license requirements vary significantly, debt collectors need to carefully understand the laws in the state which they are attempting to collect.

Several collection agencies take license in 49 states except Massachusetts, because Massachusetts’ compliance system is complex and costly, and they partner with a local collection to still provide a nationwide coverage.

A nationwide collection agency must 

• Have a through understanding of Statute of Limitations for each state, once a debt becomes older than that time-frame, they may lose the right to pursue the collection activity on the debtor (consumer).
• Should ideally perform collection activity in both English and Spanish.
• Preferably have a client portal to handle debtors online.
•  Be fully aware of the local time zone in which a debtor is located and call accordingly, else they risk violating the FDCPA guidelines.
• Not all states allow recording the call without informing the debtor first.

 

Are you a Small Business owner and searching for a Collection Agency near your physical location? 

You are not alone, there is a small misconception that a local collection agency will be able to provide a better service or magically recover more money on your accounts receivable, verses the one located on the other coast of the country.

Fact: You will never visit a Collection Agency’s office to submit accounts, in-fact you will submit accounts on their website right from your home or office.

Similarly, a local Debt Collector will not go to your debtor’s house to collect money. Then why restrict yourself to hire a Collections Agency near your office?

Go for a better collection agency, not the one closest to you. All that matters is whether or not a Debt Collection Agency is licenced to collect in your state or not.

It really does not matter if a Collection Call or a Collection Letter to your debtor originates from your city, verses from New York or San Francisco. Only the effectiveness of those services matter.

How to select a Collections Agency for your Small Business? It is more important to hire a collection agency with above average recovery rates than its peers.  Ensure that they are sufficiently insured for your protection, in case there is a dispute or a lawsuit from the debtor’s side during the collections process. Preferably licenced to collect in all 50 states. The one which hires top of the line debt collectors. You would be sharing a lot of personal information of your debtors. Are you sure the agency closest to you handles that data securely. What would happen if that data gets stolen, your small business can actually land up in a huge trouble. Therefore the first thing is to ask if they have adequate security procedures and well audited certifications. That the agency has been in business for minimum 5 to 10 years. What is the experience of their management and debt collectors? What is their collection fees? Could there be any hidden fees? The collection agency near you may be charging a higher fee even though they may have an inferior recovery rate.  Do they offer collections in both English and Spanish? Do they sincerely follow all federal and state laws like the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). They offer more products than just contingency based Collection Calls. Do they offer a cheaper 1st and 3rd party Collection Letters option, suitable for accounts less than 120 days old? How important is it for you to have all their debt collectors based in USA? If so ask them. Do they send collection letters in plain “Black & White” print or a more attention grabbing “Colored Prints”. A good collection agency may possibly charge 10%-15% more, because they have better resources and far better collection rates.  Collection agency should also do several “scrubs” like – Change of Address, Bankruptcy Check and Litigious Debtor Check, without charging you anything extra. It should be a part of their standard collection process. If you use Collection Letters service, it requires accounts to be purchased in advance. What happens if there are any unused accounts? Do they have an expiration date for them? Some good collection agencies allow you to use these unused accounts for many years, instead of forfeiting them after 6 months or 2 years. Do they have a secure online portal to enable you to submit new accounts for collections, run real time performance reports and stop collections on an accounts after a payment has been received. The list goes on…

Therefore, if you are searching for a “Collection Agency near me” then you may be making a mistake. You are not alone, in-fact many small businesses have this natural tendency.

Only time a local presence matters is when the accounts gets transferred for legal collections, because a legal suit against the debtor will be filed in the local court, depending on your jurisdiction or county. But, the good news is that almost all good Collection Agencies have a nationwide network of attorneys and their fee is usually the same if you were to go through a Collection Agency or approach them directly. In fact, since Collection Agencies regularly transfer their accounts to local lawyers near you, they are likely to act more seriously when a Collection Agency is involved because it impacts their future business as well.

Hope this article was helpful, regardless you are located in New Jersey  or California 😊.

If you need a good Collection Agency, contact us, we can refer you to a few good ones based on our knowledge and experience at no cost to you. 

Operating a towing business or being a tow truck driver involves considerable hard work and planning. Challenges of a towing business include paying for the tow truck mortgage, fuel costs, monthly insurance premium, repairs & maintenance of the truck, fatigue, marketing business on on Yellow Pages or Google, dealing with disgruntled vehicle-owners, poor driving conditions, accounts receivable, competition, business expenses, uniform and miscellaneous expenses.

Past-due accounts are a significant drag for towing operators.  This hurts their cash flow and profitability. This situation arises because of dishonored checks, payment disputes, damages or just because a car owner simply did not fulfill their obligation to make the payment as promised.

Tow truck businesses do not have an in-house expert to collect late payments while adhering to the federal/state rules and regulations that need to be followed when recovering a debt. Not following these guidelines can lead to a lawsuit from the vehicle owner. To be honest, vehicle owners are usually not that serious when payments are requested by the employees of a towing company. However, all that changes when a Debt Collection Agency gets involved.

The moment a debtor (vehicle owner) gets that first written demand or a phone call from a Collection Agency, he knows that the matter has been transferred to experts and they will continue to demand payments legally for a very long time, and may take the debtor to the court as the last resort. They are a lot more inclined to settle the matter. Collection agencies have subscriptions to various tools like “Advanced Skip Tracing”, that helps them to locate a debtor who has relocated due to genuine reasons or to hide from his payment obligations.

Transferring an account to a collection agency after 60 days of non-payment is highly recommended for the towing business. This maximizes the chances of recovery and resolving the matter in an amicable way. The three step process followed by collection agencies switches from diplomatic collections to intensive collections as the time goes by.

Glass replacement and repair companies assist clients whenever a glass breaks or loses alignment. Common services include replacement of double pane windows, windshield, laminate glass repair and other breakages involving mirrors, storefronts, partitions, shower doors, glass closures, etc. Glass repair companies can be privately owned and operated, or work as a franchise of a larger organization (like GlassDoctor). They serve both residential and business customers.

It is very common for Glass repair companies to have several accounts receivable, many of which are eventually written off as a complete loss in accounting books. To minimize loss on past-due accounts, it is important to have a good receivables strategy. Accounts which have not paid after 60-90 days, despite regular payment requests such as reminder calls and mailing invoices, have a little chance to get resolved ever. Usually the effort put in to followup on these accounts after 90 days goes waste because the little recovery that happens from handful of late paying accounts, gets wiped off by the time and cost that gets put in to attempt recovery from your overall delinquent accounts.

Once a payment has been due for over 90 days, Glass repair should definitely take full advantage of the two step collections process offered by collection companies (Attorney crafted “Collection Letters” and “Collection Calls” from an Expert Debt Collector). Collection agencies are extremely effective and efficient in collecting money.

Need a good debt collections agency: Contact us

While you focus in expanding your business, meanwhile collection agencies work as an extension of your office to recover money from your past due accounts.

You have a restoration company that helps homeowners from damages caused by water, fire and mold. You have worked hard to build your business. However several clients have not kept up with their obligation to pay for your services. This has increased the number of accounts receivable and putting stress on your cash flow. Then its a high time to hire a Collections Agency and turn those accounts from red to black.

Restoration companies can be privately owned and operated, or work as a franchise of a larger organization ( like ServPro ). They typically serve both Residential and Commercial clients. Restoration professionals have a lot in their hands. Apart from the complexity of running a small business, ever changing market conditions, pressure of complying with rules and regulations, hiring & retaining the top talent, getting new clients and preparing a full document for the damage to help file an accurate insurance claim. If the insurance deductible is higher many clients simply pay out of the pocket. Cost of the deductible can also be quite high in many cases.

Once a payment has been due for over 60-90 days, chances of getting paid drops significantly. Restoration Companies should definitely take full advantage of the two step recovery process offered by most collection companies (Attorney crafted “Collection Letters” and “Collection Calls” from an Expert Debt Collector).

Collection agencies have a vast experience in recovering money for their clients and tactics used by them can never be matched by your in-house staff trying to recover money under your own business name. If nothing works they can even take the debtor to the court.

Although collection agencies do not put “Mechanics Lien” on a property, it is highly recommended to try to recover your money today, rather than waiting years to seek unpaid compensation.

Our collection partners have extensive experience in recovering money for restoration companies.

Need a good debt collections agency: Contact us

While you focus in expanding your business, meanwhile collection agencies work as an extension of your office to recover money from your past due accounts.