Prepared to Field Every Collections Conversation?

Sponsored by SWBC

Each day, collectors are dialing your delinquent borrowers attempting to collect payment. When a collector reaches a delinquent borrower, it's a roll of the dice what kind of mood the borrower will be in. That's why it's vital to properly train collectors so they're prepared for many types of conversations. That way, they can maintain excellent professional relationships with potentially long-term members. Training collectors also can have a measurable impact on job satisfaction, tenure and turnover—no one without proper training and confidence wants to spend all day on the phone having dozens of conversations with borrowers who are frustrated. 

Foundational Collector Qualities
A fallacy when hiring collectors is that a candidate needs to have collections experience. While that can help, it's not the sole contributing factor for an effective agent. Foundational characteristics and emotional intelligence are required to be successful as what I would call "white-hat" collectors. First and foremost, these include abiding by all regulations, including the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and applying a strong dose of human compassion and understanding.

In addition, the person should also be:

1. A confident communicator

At the end of the day, you need someone who is completely comfortable asking for money and the required information to stay in touch with the debtor. Your agent also needs to know not to take it personally when a borrower is having a bad day and takes it out on the collector. Top agents are also "agile conversationalists" who can quickly pivot and drive a conversation to the end goal of collecting payment. Being able to effectively communicate during those tough conversations without coming across as attacking or threatening is a highly regarded skill in this field. 

2. A great listener

In a University of Southern Maine thesis on the importance of effecting listening, active listening is defined as deploying four listening techniques to better improve communication: paraphrasing, summarizing main points of a conversation, recognizing verbal messages, and responding to feelings the speaker has expressed. Collectors who deploy these active listening techniques are more likely to treat the debtor as a human being and not some account number in a system.  

3. A good problem-solver

Thinking beyond, "You owe our credit union X amount, please pay now," requires creative solutioning within the parameters that have been set for a credit union’s collections team. The ability to think critically and come up with recommendations for alternative money sources, scheduling out payments, or offering a program that could help the debtor get back on track requires quick thinking. 

4. Able to balance empathy with objectives

Collectors need to understand that a debtor may be having a tough time financially—and often, this means the debtor has experienced some sort of hardship, be it a divorce, the death of a family member, a medical issue or job loss. A collector who knows how and when to empathize with a debtor while staying solution-oriented will help to maintain relationships with your delinquent borrowers—and collect on balances. 

High-Quality Training
Once you’ve recognized these and any other qualities you’d like your collectors to have, you can train them using a documented program that introduces new collectors to your company culture, collection procedures, systems and regulation.

Typically, good training for collectors includes a mix of classroom and hands-on training. Shadowing veteran collectors and listening to previously recorded calls to analyze what went well and what could be improved upon can both contribute to developing a successful, long-term collector. Having valuable online tools—such as quick reference guides, scripting, and rebuttal guides—that a collector can reference on demand will help your collectors beyond the initial weeks of training. 

Of course, playing out different scenarios through role-playing is an often-used and effective training technique for collections. There's always a new situation coming up, and having a training team that recognizes the need to constantly update materials and informs their collectors of the new findings helps to create an all-star team.

Brad Young is EVP/financial institutions group at CUES Supplier member SWBC, San Antonio. Learn how thinking about loan portfolio management can benefit your credit union in our latest free ebook, The Recipe for Risk Management. 

Learn more about the CUES School of Member Experience™, Sept. 9-10, 2019, in San Diego.