12 things you should see and hear on collection calls

They’re some of the most important phone calls your Finance staffers make in a day – the ones to get your money out of customers’ hands and into your bank account. Which means you’ll want to be confident your people are making the most of those calls. Hopefully you keep an ear out when folks are doing collection calls.  You’ll want to keep an eye out as well. Consider what you’re seeing and hearing in light of these twelve best practices that make for the most effective collection calls:

1. Are they armed for the most common excuses? Much of the work happens with collection calls before the receiver is ever picked up. You want your staffers to come prepped with a list of the most common excuses for nonpayment, along with a series of responses for each.
2. Do they have the file in front of them? Another part of that pre-call process: Doing your homework on that specific account. Staffers should review the past payment history of the specific customer before the collection press is made. Keeping that file at the ready will help staffers reference and even fact check depending on what they hear on the phone.
3. Are they speaking slowly? Especially when emotions start to run high, the pace of speech tends to speed up. But that can undermine your company’s authority and credibility.
4. Do they use the debtor’s name? Yes, do this too many times and you sound like a caricature of a used car salesman. But when staffer use the name of the person it can add a personal touch that gets results.
5. Are their pens moving? Notes are vital to keep track of what’s promised and when, as well as general impressions.  You don’t necessarily need to be seeing this while the staffers are on the phone, but they should be doing it as soon as they hang up, while the interaction is fresh in their minds.
6. Are they using silence? It’s one of the top tools in any collector’s arsenal. Often you want to hear very little when your staffers are making dunning calls – it means they’re letting customers speak and having a connection with them.
7. Do they try open-ended questions? Again, let the customers take up the bulk of the talk time. If your people lob up too many questions that can be answered with a yes or no, it will be tough to get productive answers that work towards solutions.
8. Can they redirect? Chances are, a debtor’s going to try and sidetrack from the issue at hand: the money they owe you. Whether they’re claims of quality problems or a long drawn out story about a software conversion problem, you need people with the ability to quickly bring things back on point.
9. Are they smiling? Some staffers may be skeptical, but customer service pros swear by it. Positivity comes across over the phone lines when staffers smile.
10. Is everything else minimized on their computer screens? There are so many distractions around – the last thing you want is for staffers to lose focus from the task at hand. Opening that email that just popped up is a major distraction. Encourage staffers to keep nothing open on their desktops but the customer account they are calling on.
11. Are they summarizing? The final thing you should hear is a recap of the action plan your staffer has hammered out with the customer: “So you are mailing a check today, March 20, for the full past-due amount.”
12. Do they keep it brief? While there’s no ideal time length for a collections call, the shorter the better. It means the conversation is focused and on topic. Plus, that means staffers can get to the next cash-flow-boosting call.