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Posts Tagged ‘debt collection’
Wednesday, March 10th, 2010
Late invoice payment and outstanding debts is an issue that continues to cast a shadow over many parts of the UK Business Community with some alarming figures being released relating to the number of companies that are being forced into liquidation and administration despite being owed considerable sums of money. Yet this need not be the case providing expedient and cost effective steps are taken to recover outstanding debts.
One Company that has an excellent reputation for dealing with serious matters such as the Collection of outstanding debts is Federal Management. This Lancashire based Business has their Head Office in Skelmersdale as well as offices in London, and operate their renowned Debt Collection Services across the UK & EU, recovering Millions of Pounds every year for their clients. They are only too aware of the problems facing UK Businesses with regards to late payments and outstanding invoices etc as well as the need to maintain existing business relationships where possible.
Federal Management began life in 2004 by initially delivering their Debt Collection services to predominantly small businesses up and down the UK but their growth quickly gathered momentum as word spread of their low cost services. A development of existing services along with continued internal development has seen them emerge as one of the UK’s Leading Commercial Debt Collection Companies.
One of the key elements to Federal Management’s success has been the high level of internal investment. Thousands of pounds have been spent on cutting edge technology that gives them the edge over their competitors as well as the ongoing training of existing personnel ensures that they deliver a service that is professional and quickly gets results. Attention to detail and highly diligent staff ensure the potential of recovering monies owing is at a much higher level than normal. The professional management systems they employ saw them awarded the ISO9001 accreditation in January.
They boast a highly experienced and dedicated Collections Team that deal solely with the pursuit of outstanding Debts and are relentless in their efforts. In addition to the Collections Team, they also have an Internal Legal Team to deal with disputed Debts and have Professional Collection Officers to visit Debtors who ignore demands for payment.
Such has been the success of Federal Management, in early 2009 they were awarded a place on the High Growth Programme, a Government backed scheme led by the North West Development Agency to aid the growth and development of ‘High Growth’ Businesses. This will aid their expansion and growth as they continue to go from strength to strength.
Marc Curtis-Smith, Managing Director of the Company says “At Federal Management, as members of the Credit Services Association, we pride ourselves on delivering a highly professional service to our clients and coupled with our High Collection rates, has been the main reason for our success. We have literally hundreds of clients that benefit from the services that we offer, from Large PLC’s to local small Businesses.”
“Quite simply, the service that we offer is unrivalled as we provide a low fixed cost service that delivers results and is one of the reasons why we have been so successful. We even have a considerable number of Law firms that use our services to recover their debts and this gives good testament to our ability to deliver a highly professional service at a fraction of the time and cost one would normally associate with recovering bad debts”
Concludes Marc “We are proud to say that the greatest form of advertisement for our services is simply ‘word of mouth’. Our services are designed to maximize the prospect of a successful collection of Debts whilst minimizing the cost to our clients. Anybody that is experiencing debtor or late payment problems should contact us sooner rather than later.”
For further information on Federal Management and how they can help your business, simply call them free on 0800 043 6922 and take the first steps to recovering your money back.
Tags: Commercial, debt collection, debt recovery, federal management
Posted in Debt News, Financial News | No Comments »
Tuesday, January 19th, 2010
A recent survey has revealed that businesses around the world have an increased likelihood of outsourcing their debt collection requirements in the aftermath of the recent financial crisis.
The figures, recently released as results from the Global Collections Review which surveyed over 3500 companies across four continents, revealed that when it came down to international business to business debts, along with domestic trade debts, companies were often outsourcing their debt recovery as a means to expedite the process.
“Of all countries surveyed, Belgium and the Netherlands stand out with the highest percentage of companies increasing their use of outsourced collections services (44 per cent and 43 per cent, respectively). Amongst eight different criteria for selecting a collections agency, businesses across all countries deemed the success rate of collections efforts to be most important, followed by price, global expertise, local knowledge and easy access to up-to-date information,” the survey revealed.
The review itself gives more than useful insight into the attitude of businesses towards debt collection and shows that despite the expected similarities such as how businesses assess success rates or intimate knowledge of in-country and global collections landscapes, the survey also revealed many geographic and cultural variations.
The survey looked at the impact of the recent economic woes had on outsourcing debt collection needs, and also gave some insight into the factors that companies consider when they are looking for a debt collection agency, as well as those that might discourage a business from outsourcing their collections. For example, one note of interest showed a difference in opinion when considering the importance of the relationship with the debtor in appointing a collections supplier.
Another finding was the additional services in collection agency’s portfolio, which proved universally to be the least important factor in the selection of a debt collections service provider.
The survey was conducted among 3,538 businesses across 20 countries including Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong and the USA
Tags: business to business, debt collection, Global Collections Review, outsourcing
Posted in Debt News, International Debt News | No Comments »
Friday, December 11th, 2009
Two potential future party leaders were threatened with legal action for failing to pay their council tax and a senior member of the Tory frontbench faced a visit from debt collectors over an unpaid water bill.
Foreign secretary David Miliband, who between 2005 and 2006 oversaw town halls in his capacity as communities and local government minister, received a refresher class on what happens to residents who don’t get round to paying the tax set by local authorities to deliver local services.
South Tyneside council, which covers Miliband’s South Shields constituency home, sent the man seen as a favourite to replace Gordon Brown an overdue council tax reminder threatening legal action for late payment of £64.44.
“To avoid recovery proceedings: the overdue amount of £64.44 must be paid in full within seven days of receipt of this notice,” the reminder stated. “If you fail to pay the overdue amount by the date stated, this will result in the full outstanding balance of £685.44 becoming due. If after a further seven days you have failed to repay this amount, the council will commence legal proceedings for the full amount plus costs. These costs will total £62.”
Miliband’s dues paled next to Michael Gove, the Conservatives’ shadow schools secretary and a close ally of David Cameron. In May 2008, he was told by Waverley council in Surrey that he faced court proceedings if he failed to pay the total £1,734.38 bill within 10 days after failing to pay his council tax instalments.
The payment bumped his monthly claim up to £3,733.34 that month. In the same year, he twice had a claim for £40.34 for home insurance rejected for failing to file receipts. The claim was later queried because the address on his receipt was his first, not second, home, which was listed as his constituency address. The receipt was subsequently paid.
Dominic Grieve, the shadow justice secretary and MP for Beaconsfield, received a final demand for a £96.27 water bill last April, warning him that a debt collection agency would be deployed or court action taken if he did not pay up. “This is serious – act now to avoid further action,” it said.
He wasn’t the only one. Ann Cryer, Labour MP for Keighley, received similar wording in a final demand for non payment of £352.92 in water charges for her London home, which was almost three months overdue. Former Labour minister Tom Watson, who shared a flat with MP Iain Wright, received a final demand from Thames Water on 24 June 2008, for £211.91. It warned the debt would be passed on to a debt collection agency if it wasn’t paid.
Tags: David Miliband, debt collection, Michael Gove
Posted in Debt News | No Comments »
Friday, December 4th, 2009
The CSA has lashed out at advice websites for “encouraging” people to evade debts.
In a powerpoint presentation which has been seen by the Guardian, the CSA (Credit Services Association) claims such sites are guilty of “encouraging” people to evade debts, provide “breeding grounds for misinformation” and “insult” banks and debt collectors.
The CSA are, of course, the trade body for debt collection agencies and is holding workshops for its members aim at combating organisations such as Consumer Action Group.
A section of the presentation entitled “What do they actually do?” said online forums “celebrate ‘victories’ against creditors, set up tallies of how much has been refunded in bank charges [and] provide standard template letters”.
It outlined some of the most common claims made and said it had provided the Ministry of Justice with evidence of bad practice as well as suggesting possible amendments to primary legislation with the consumer affairs minister.
It added that it had “discussed consumer forums and CMCs [claims management companies] with the OFT”.
The trade body named five sites: the Consumer Action Group, Blagger.com, Penaltychargesforum.co.uk, Getoutofdebtfree.org and Legalbeagles.info.
But Marc Gander, a co-founder of the CAG, said it was “a real shame” debt recovery firms felt they had to set up a mechanism to combat sites such as his.
“They seem to view us as some variation of animal rights activists,” he added.
The CAG, set up in 2006, was one of the first online self-help organisations to help people challenge banks over “unfair” charges and loan agreements that could be unenforceable.
Similar high-profile websites include Martin Lewis’s “consumer revenge” site MoneySavingExpert.com, which was not named by the CSA.
The consumer revolt over current account penalty charges triggered a huge surge in the number of sites offering to help people take on banks, credit card companies and loan providers.
Some of these were described as “irresponsible” by the debt collectors’ body, but Gander said bank charges would never have been made a priority by the OFT without websites such as his.
The OFT launched a high-profile legal battle over the issue, but it ended in defeat last month.
“Consumer websites are here for keeps,” Gander said. “They had better learn to live with it. How many people do they really want to be in conflict with?”
A spokesman for the CSA said websites that helped borrowers manage their debts responsibly were to be welcomed, but those setting out simply to help debtors avoid debts were “grossly irresponsible”.
“Avoiding debts is not a victimless crime – it impacts everybody in the long run,” the spokesman said.
“If a website gave advice on how to shoplift, consumers – and retailers – would be up in arms, so how can it be right for a site to effectively encourage people to make off with money that isn’t theirs?”
The spokesman said the CSA had relaunched its website with a consumer help section and engaged with consumer advice bodies to help people manage their debts.
Tags: Credit Services Association, CSA, debt collection
Posted in Debt News, Financial News | No Comments »
Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009
The Credit Services Association (CSA) has managed to halt plans to reduce the debt collection timeframe from six years to three.
In a combined effort with other industry partners, the Credit Services Association has managed to persuade the government to halt plans for changes to the Civil Law Reform Bill. As a draft, the Bill proposed reforms that would reduce the period within which a debt could be collected from six years to three.
The CSA successfully argued, however, that by doing so it would put debtors at a greater risk as any reduction in limitations would mean that creditors would go further to recover debt faster, rather than negotiate long term repayment plans.
If the new plan had succeeded in going through, legal action could have been sort much earlier in the debt recovery process and this would have had a harmful impact on debtors and their credit ratings.
The CSA’s Head of Compliance, Claire Aynsley, said “Whereas creditors would be well within their rights to take such action, one can only imagine the consumer, media and political uproar there would have been had more debtors been dragged through the courts. This is assuming the court system could have coped with the increased caseload, and the advice groups could manage the growing number of debtors needing their help.”
“Many of the debts that are sold on by utilities, banks etc are between two and four years old,” she explained. “If the limitation period was reduced to anything less than four years such accounts would be uncollectable. If you consider that more than £15 billion of uncollected debt was purchased in 2007, and that figure is likely to be larger today, one begins to understand what a disastrous impact writing off such huge sums would have on the economy.”
Tags: civil law reform bill, Claire Aynsley, CSA, debt collection
Posted in Debt News, Financial News, International Debt News | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 1st, 2009
Across the UK banks are being urged to prepare for New Year woes due to an expected spike in problem loans and to ensure that their debt collection departments are running on full steam ahead.
According to the credit checks agency Experian, January is traditionally the worst time of year for debt defaults with the company saying that the recent surge in unemployment and personal insolvencies will make the first quarter “the busiest period ever.”
Simon Waller, Experian’s head of collections for UK and Ireland, said “Christmas is a catalyst for delinquency and bad debt, with credit card and overdraft debt traditionally peaking in the New Year. Economic indicators and feedback from our collections clients suggests that the first quarter of 2010 could be the busiest period ever seen.”
Experian is anticipating the worst due to the 771,000 job losses in the first nine months of the year, a 94% increase on 2008, and the record quarterly personal insolvency rate of 41,390 for the three months to September.
Banks have also been cranking up their marketing to households in the run up to Christmas. The Call Prevention Registry has seen a 50% increase in “nuisance calls” from debt management organisations in the past month trying to persuade customers to take out new loans.
Mr Waller said: “With unemployment at its highest since 1996 and record numbers of redundancies and insolvencies, it is vital for collections departments to do everything to ensure that their people can cope with the influx of new cases.”
Tags: debt collection, experian, new year loans
Posted in Debt News, Financial News | No Comments »
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
The enforceability of hundreds of millions of pounds of credit card debt with be affected by legal test cases at the end of this month.
Manchester High Court is the venue for five days worth of time for twelve seperate cases to be heard which will help to determine a variety of legal issues under the Consumer Credit Act (CCA), with several of the cases being brought forwards by Cartel Client Review, a prominent claims management company.
Carl Wright, of Cartel Client Review, is hoping that a favourable decision is reached that will forced the bank and credit card companies to settle thousands of similar cases on his books.
“We want the judges to rule on these claims, providing precedents which will prevent the banks and credit card companies delaying on paying out on consumer claims any longer,” Mr Wright says.
This past year has seen an unprecedented amount of court action between lenders and borrowers with tens of thousands of similar cases yet to be heard.
Borrowers are aguing that the debts against them cannot be enforced because lenders have failed to follow CCA guidelines which the law states “a lender cannot ask a court to enforce a debt if the lender’s original agreement failed to comply with certain requirements.”
“Once you have established the agreement is defective, in at least one of a number of specific ways, the court has no discretion to grant an enforcement order in favour of the creditor,” says barrister Oliver Mishcon.
However, due to a new Consumer Credit Act in 2006, this lack of discretion for judges only applies to regulated consumer credit agreements entered into before April 7 2007.
The new CCA agreement states that loan agreements for fixed sums or credit cards must contain three “prescribed terms”:
- the amount of credit; or the limit of the credit, or the manner in which the limit will be decided
- the rate of interest
- how the borrower is to repay the debt.
Bob Imrie, who trains trading standards officers and also claims management firms in the operation of the CCA, is doubtful that the courts will let people escape their debts, saying “Courts are not very sympathetic to claims that terms and conditions were not provided to customers. You’ve got a real problem trying to undo an agreement on a technicality; you’ve got to provide evidence the banks behaved wrongly.”
However, the potential use of the law to favour debtors was highlighted by a case in October this year at Stockport County Court.
Deputy district judge Howarth issued a decision in favour of a Mr Yates, so that his credit card debt of £6,585 can never be collected.
Mr Yates had run up the debt after taking out the MBNA card in 2003.
In January 2009, the debt was sold, or “assigned”, to a debt collection firm and it swiftly took Mr Yates to court to get the money back.
He argued that the copy of the original agreement supplied by MBNA to the court was incomplete and illegible, and so it was unclear that the prescribed terms had in fact been included.
Th debt recovery did not turn up for the hearing and lost by default, but at the request of Mr Yates’ lawyers the judge went on to declare that the debt was unenforceable.
Mr Yates’ solicitor, Alun Thomas of law firm JW Hughes in Llandudno, says he has 300 similar cases on his books.
“There are solicitors up and down the country handling many more and there are many cases, but almost all of them have yet to be decided.”
Tags: Cartel Client Review, CCA, Consumer Credit Act, debt collection, Manchester Crown Court
Posted in Debt News, Financial News, International Debt News | 1 Comment »
Friday, November 20th, 2009
Connecticut city plans to hire a debt collector to recoup taxes that are more than three years delinquent.
The city issued a request for proposals for debt collector services Wednesday and will open bids next month.
Supervisor of Assessments and Collections Michael Mordarski said the contract will not cost the city anything, since the debt recovery company makes its profit by charging delinquent taxpayers up to 15 percent of their back taxes.
To avoid getting charged the debt collection fee, property owners with back taxes more than three years old should settle their accounts with the tax office now, Mordarski said.
Mordarski said the debt collector would be able to track down delinquent taxpayers that the city cannot get a hold of. There is about $4 million worth back taxes owed to the city up to 2007.
A group of city employees will consider the various proposals. The selected company is expected to begin debt collection in January.
Tags: connecticut, debt collection, michael mordarski
Posted in Debt News, Financial News, International Debt News | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
The Pedernales Electric Cooperative board of directors considered a debt collection proposal at Monday’s meeting to correct a system that purges $3 million annually on delinquency rates and non-collectable debt.
The co-op also announced a slight rate reduction for electricity and a plan to develop a member “Bill of Rights” and have members vote on bylaws changes in June.
Short-term, mid-term and long-term changes to debt recovery were submitted at the meeting by Eddie Dauterive, member services manager. “The whole goal is to lower our bad debt,” Dauterive told the board.
Short-term adjustments to the debt collection plan include, cooperative-wide guidelines for fee adjustments and delinquency exceptions, up-front deposits and payments for services, social security and driver’s license number databases, and clear collection guidelines for debt collection.
The co-op says the non-collectable debt is less than one-half of one percent of monthly collections.
Tags: debt collection, Pedernales Electric Cooperative
Posted in Debt News, International Debt News | No Comments »
Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
Financial sector experts are predicting increases in interest rates and charges by credit card companies as they attempt to offset their debt recovery requirements by trying to claw back as much money as possible after seeing a significant increase in the amount of bad debt. The expected move is not coming as a surprise to many as talk about it has been ongoing for some time and is move that will ultimately cost UK consumers, with those who are up-to-date with their payments more likely to suffer in the medium term.
This has been an ongoing situation for some time within the UK credit card industry and in many ways, it has been a self-fulfilling situation as customers who have been squeezed to offset the costs of those who default and miss payments are finding that they are then defaulting and increasing the debt collection requirements cycle. At some point there will inevitably be a balance point reached in respect of default numbers but for the time being it would seem that there is still a large amount of upside for the short and medium terms.
The UK financial sector has been severely damaged by the large amount of write offs of bad debt and, even if the economy were to recover tomorrow, the write offs would still continue for some time and, of course, bring with them a knock on effect for quite some time. There is no quick fix or overnight way out of this particular situation, and interest rate increases n credit cards is probably the last helpful of all options available.
Tags: credit card charges, credit card debt, debt collection, increased interest rates
Posted in Debt News, Financial News | No Comments »
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