Debt Collection In The Era of “Have It All” Software

The phrase “have it all” is most often associated with personal development—usually referring to the idea of balancing a fabulous career with a full personal life. Safe bet it’s never been used in the same sentence with debt collection.

But here goes: Debt collection has entered a new era, and “have it all” is an apt description of what is changing. While several years ago it seemed collections organizations might have to shift resources from driving performance improvements to complying with regulations, there’s no longer a need for that tradeoff. Modern debt management software is fully configurable in ways that enable companies to excel simultaneously in both aspects of the business.

What does “have it all” mean for debt management?

It means that without expensive customization services, you can have software that works exactly like you want it to for your business. So not only your core collections and recovery operations, but other groups—compliance, bankruptcy, legal, SCRA, complaint handling, dispute resolution, and more—can realize their own software wishlists. It’s the same software, but different groups configure it for their particular purposes while sharing common functionality as well as elements like data, business rules, and workflows.

What does “fully configurable” mean in debt management software?

It means that data model, decision/action rules, workflows, UI, queuing, reporting, and audit tracking can all be modified by business analysts and other subject matter experts/power users within collections organizations.  The people who know the business best have controls directly in their hands. IT is freed for high-value tasks only tech professionals can handle, such as building screens and interfaces within our frameworks, to meet specific needs, or integrating with external systems.

Balancing fabulous performance with full compliance

In the have-it-all era, the configurable software you use to achieve a performance edge also helps you improve regulatory compliance. 

For instance, a business analyst could configure form-like pages to capture information about consumer contact preferences/permissions and inconvenient times to call. This new data is then used in rules driving automated contacts and enforcing compliant workflows, as well as providing time reminders and other guidance for agents. That’s exactly what two Debt Manager clients are doing to comply with the 2020 changes to Regulation F of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA).

The important thing to understand about this is that the analyst—working within the regular user interface and having no database expertise—is actually extending the software’s data model. Because new tables are being creating in the database, the added data is immediately available to drive business rules, workflows, searches, automated communications, queues, pop-up alerts, and other dynamic user interface elements. It can be exchanged in real time via APIs with external systems and made available via portals to third-party agencies and other business partners.

With so many pressing business concerns today, why should collections operations have to choose between priorities? Modern debt management software lets you have it all.