In debt management, everything comes down to money. Even the collections systems you use are about stretching that last dollar or pound or euro until it snaps.

However, if you don’t know what’s on the market today, you don’t know what you’re missing. You might be missing the opportunity to make a dramatic improvement in your performance and productivity, without spending a whole ton of money.

In my last post, I pointed out ways that you’re probably leaving money on the table in your approach to IFRS 9. Now I’m going to repeat myself. If you spend all your time trying to move cap ex into op ex, or substantially reduce op ex, you’re probably leaving money on the table.

The Dreaded Omnichannel

Let me give you an example, and I’m sorry to be so obvious, but yes, it’s one of ours. Our Customer Communication Services for Collections isn’t a debt management platform, it’s a way of managing and optimizing omnichannel collections communications. Put another way, it helps you get through to borrowers faster, enabling them to make payment arrangements that work, and then make the payments easier.

So is it like a dialler? No. But a lot of firms that have a dialler think they have all the communications tech they need.

The other factor about omnichannel collections that many seem to miss is how, for less than the cost of four FTE, you can move your collections into a 24/7 capability. Without extending call centre hours. There is more than enough evidence about the effectiveness of channel choice outside of working hours — look at television ratings!

In fact, one of the major reasons debt collectors have for not bringing on a system like CCS (sorry for the acronym) is that they assume their customers “won’t like using omni channel.” Omni channel is a buzzword that just means you talk to customers through the channel they prefer – email, phone, app, website. Why would customers not want what they prefer? It doesn’t make sense.

The other main reason why debt managers say they don’t want CCS is that they don’t understand the benefits case. Fair enough — you do have to see how it’s going to drive down costs, enhance the customer journey, improve your collection rate and generate an ROI several times over. If you’re not clear on that after talking to FICO, shame on us.

Fancy Maths

This doesn’t just apply to communications. If you knew as soon as I went one day past due that I had 90% probability of not paying unless you sued me, would you still work me through the dialler every day? If I’m 90% likely to pay you without you contacting me, wouldn’t you just leave me alone and call someone else?

You can get that kind of information with predictive analytics, which can work within your existing debt management platform. No rip and replace needed, no cap ex, just an analytic add-on.

Forget all the fancy KS stats and trade-off curves — analytics can stop you from overworking accounts, underworking others, and not working the rest at the right time. I would argue that NOT using analytics to do this is leaving money on the table.

Ready for a Go at Omni?

Bring the fancy math and omnichannel collections together and not only will you have a greater chance of meeting the many forces of change you are grappling with across collections and recovery, but you’ll move to the lead running pack of collections capabilities, delight both customers and regulators and be confident any money left on the table is simply tips for a job well done!

You might be asking, “Bruce, fill in the gap — HOW MUCH money am I leaving on the table?” Good question! There’s only one sure way to find out: Give us a shout. Or you can just leave a comment below.