Some customers just won’t pay you, or charge a payment back once a service was provided. It is a normal business phenomenon, for some companies and sectors more than others. Some of the companies we’ve worked with have seen 3% and more of their revenue eaten up by losses. Not knowing why, most forget about losses and try to view them as the cost of doing business, while focusing on detection and prevention of loss-causing customers before those are caused. The end result? Hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions of lost dollars left unclaimed, and a business that could have grown much quicker that ends up focusing on limiting its ability to sell in fear of defaulting customers instead of selling more. To a small business, this can be a death blow. There’s a better way to approach this unfortunate situation. Proactive Loss Management is more than simply managing accounts receivables; it’s a process that combines several activities to follow up and understand and resolve losses and their causes in a systematic way. When implementing these activities, some of our customers saw immediate upside, up to 10% of recovery within a few weeks. Imagine cutting down losses by 10% with a simple process; how much more can you sell in a month? Some of our customers found that they are not only able to take more risks, but that customers who went through this process and recovered created top line growth that was bigger than the recovered amount, up to 10% increase in revenues. How can that be done? Proactive Loss Management is comprised of several activities: Root cause analysis The first question to ask about any defaulting customer is “why?”. Why aren’t they paying? You’ll discover that customers have many different reasons and that those reasons will inform your operational processes and make you more efficient and improve your product. You may discover that your invoices have a distorted layout, or that your descriptor on the credit card’s billing statement is wrong and prompts chargebacks, or that the your legal contract is ambiguous. Any of these creates losses that are a result of a misunderstanding, more than malicious intent. All are also fixable and can make a huge difference in payments in a short time. Furthermore, not only will you solve existing customers’ issues, you’ll be able to prevent them from repeating for future customers, compounding this positive effect. Personalization As losses mature you’ll run across more customers with unique reasons for non-payment. Much like optimizing front end conversion, personalizing the Loss Management experience is important and reaches both better results and greater customer satisfaction. Segment your customers based on their personal details and financial situation, both those that you had before they defaulted and what you learn based on their responses after they have. The more accurate you are about addressing a customer’s pain, the more likely they are to respond to you and be willing to work with you on a solution; try to force them into a one-size-fits-all solution, and you’ll easily lose them and any recovery opportunity. Follow up Forgetting to pay is easy. Even if you’ve reached an agreement with a customer, staying top of mind so they’ll pay when they need to is important. Whether they are in a grace period or losses have already materialized, you need to be friendly but firm and demand the payment you are owed. Multiple-channel escalating follow up is best for getting customers to respond and tell you why they’re not paying, or pay when they need to. Constantly optimizing on the content and design of your communication will help you get more responses faster. Retention Proactive Loss Management is focused on retention. By thinking about losses as lost relationships rather than just a sum of money that needs to be recovered, merchants enjoy better customer retention. We’ve seen customer lifetime value grow significantly with customers going through Proactive Loss Management since, counterintuitively, going through a default that’s managed the right way increases brand trust and loyalty. Bottom line It’s easy to forget about dealing with receivables. It’s an unpleasant job, definitely not the delightful part of your product and offering. Still, it’s an important one - for the money you’re losing, for the relationships you can recover, and for the insights it can generate. Start today and you may see benefit in just a few weeks!  

How many times have you read this headline? How many times have you discovered something that you didn't really know already? We wanted to change that trend because frankly, there are things we want you to know so you can enjoy them when you're working with us. Easy communication: we try everything we can to not call you at inconvenient times. In fact, we'd rather get you using our online portal to negotiate easy solutions to your outstanding balances. Much like you, we lead busy lives and want to take care of bills at our own pace, when it's the right time for us. No hidden fees: we are upfront about what we ask you to pay and we don't invent fees like administration or convenience fees. We believe in transparent processes and that means that even longer payment plans that we accept will carry minimal to no additional cost from TrueAccord. Disputing charges: think that you were wronged? We want to hear about it. We may not be able to change the outstanding amount but we've been successful with getting debtors and creditors to talk and settle. If you have a valid concern, we won't badger you with the dry letter of the law - we want to help more than just recover as much as possible, as fast as possible. See, these are the things we want you to know. We know getting into a recovery process isn't fun, and we're here to simplify it and to help you get through it easily. Follow our blog, follow us on Twitter or write to us at nomoredebts@trueaccord.com if you want to hear more.  

We know scammers roam free on the web, and we know they use people's innocence to extort them for money. What's easier than calling people in a tough spot and get them to pay you money they don't really owe? It's an ugly phenomenon. It's also the reason why we always get our business customers to introduce us to their customers when a recovery process begins - there's so much to worry about, why have to worry whether you're being scammed? Turns out it doesn't stop there. Some of these scammers would rather not do the dirty work themselves, and they're looking for someone to do it for them. We never imagined it works that way in recovery services, so imagine our surprise when we got an email from a previously unknown connection, providing us with the details of a debtor and a debt and urging us to work on it. Pretty aggressively so, I must add. We won't disclose private information so there's not much we can say about Mr X, the alleged debtor. A quick investigation exposed the scammers, and we're hopeful that Mr X won't be troubled by fake collection calls. Given how easily his information was given, we're concerned it's not the last he'll hear from fake collectors. This case raises an important issue. People trade personal information too easily. Who knows where his customer's details got exposed; too many companies feel that consumers' information isn't worth protecting once they owe money. This couldn't be farther from the truth; if anything, sensitive information must be protected more rigorously when its discovery might embarrass consumers. Apparently, some players don't care and will use any chance they have to make a dime. Luckily, this time they emailed the wrong company. Finally, here are some words of advice: Contacted by a collector? Make sure you understand who that company is and how the debt was placed with them. One of the things we allow consumers to do in many cases is settle directly with their creditor, reducing their concern with paying us directly, before they get to know us. Got a suspicious email? Search for it online. Many scam catcher websites will warn you about common scams. If your identity was stolen or information about you is publicly available without your consent, it could be a violation of the law. Read about identity theft in the FTC's website, and be vigilant about sharing your information with risky websites. Did you get fake collection calls or emails? Tell us!  

Many businesses, especially web based ones, live and die by customer acquisition and growth. They invest money and time in new ways to attract new users to their service, while under investing and sometimes neglecting retention efforts. While growth is important, retaining customers is a much more profitable activity - active current customers spend more, and are more likely to use other services your offer. Within that group of current customers, customers who churn sometimes provide you with the most important feedback. Why do customers churn, and end up owing you money? There could be many reasons, and often times the least of which is some malicious intent on these customers' part. Some find that your product wasn't what they expected; some have billing issues; others had a negative service experience. What do you gain from talking to these customers? They are often your most vocal critics. While that criticism is hard to listen to or read, and sometimes even exaggerated, it stems from a genuinely bad experience. Each customer who's willing to talk to you represents dozens, maybe hundreds of others who disappear without saying a word. Listen to the content rather than the style, and you'll discover a plethora of relevant product and process feedback. They care. Some unhappy customers will pay your dues then disappear off your platform forever, without ever voicing their concerns. Some of your defaulted customers care enough, feel strongly enough, that they opt to not pay and get in trouble with you. Winning a customer like that back potentially wins you a strong brand advocate. They owe you money. Bottom line, there is revenue to be recovered by reconciling with churned customers. It starts with the money they owe you, but their life time value, if won back as customers, can provide much higher ROI on recovery activities than you may intially think. Approaching and reconciling with churned customers is an art and science. Follow our blog to learn more about how we do it!  

It was an early morning in the summer of 2012, and my phone rang. I didn't recognize the out-of-state number, and didn't pick up. I don't usually pick up unless I know who's calling. The next day, the same thing happened. In the following week I received a call every morning, each time from a different phone number. Eventually I picked up. We have an important message for you, said a robotic voice, please remain on the line. Unbelievable, they're calling me and I need to wait? Still, the calls would just continue. I stayed on the line. Within a minute I was already deep in conversation with a rude, aggressive debt collector who promptly notified that I have a late payment. I then realized why: I had forgotten to pay the balance for a card I had with one of the big retail chains. It happens, and luckily, I could afford to pay it. Not everyone can. I offered to pay with my credit card. No, said the person aggressively, that is not acceptable. I can use a debit card but that will cost me a $15 "convenience" fee. Heck, I'll just pay with a check, but I don't have my checks next to me. I'll pay later today, I told her. TODAY, she said, with an angry tone. Today, I accepted. That experience stayed with us when we started thinking about TrueAccord. Why not treat people with respect? Why subject them to robotic callers and hidden fees? Why not offer convenient, flexible ways to pay? That rude collector and the negative experience I underwent simply due to forgetting a payment has spawned a business plan. We can do better. We can help businesses get paid without creating alienation between them and their customers, and we can bring back feedback on what doesn't work and why disgruntled ex-customers are reluctant to settle a debt. We can help debtors settle without pushing them down more or making them feel disrespected. The result is what you see here. If you got an email from us, you can count on us to work with you. Debts aren't fun, but you don't want to disregard them either. We'll be fair with you, but walk you in a path that ends with your obligations met. We view it as our mission to make you successful and make sure your voice is heard. Welcome to TrueAccord!