Training and how to be a better collector

Once you were on the collection floor, there was some continual training beyond the initial training weeks. Training happened for one of two reasons - to keep current with knowledge as required by federal and state laws, and to sharpen your abilities as a collector. There were also the optional seminars about moving cheese, getting what you want and other positive motivational seminars, most of which were offered during regular business hours when I wasn't there. Besides, I know where my cheese is - it's in the refrigerator.

Knowledge training happened via computer modules. You logged in, and read through essentially power-point slides of information on keeping client data protected (shred everything), updates to laws and regulations about lending as changes happened, and company code of conduct (don't ask your colleagues if you can suck on their toes - seriously, that happened). There was a simple quiz you had to click the correct answers to, and then you passed and could go back to collecting.

Ability sharpening training became a serious issue about six months in. There were a few class-action lawsuits involving the parent company and non-disclosure of all calls being monitored and recorded, so there was a threat of a docking of bonus if you failed to announce that at the beginning of the call. That led to a further examination of collection practices, and finally the director decided he was going to sit down with all 400 or so collectors in small groups over the space of two weeks to go over calls and how we could improve as collectors.

He sat down with us in the executive conference room - a group of about fifteen of us. He smiled, and started right in. "Frankly, listening to the phone calls, I'm amazed we do as well as we do on the bottom line. Which I don't mean as a down note - I'm not here to tell you that you all suck. What I am here to tell you is that there is a huge room for improvement, which means everyone in this room has the potential to absolutely crush your goals every month. And honestly, that's why you come to work every day, right? You want the bonus check. Let's listen to some calls, and see what we can to do help you get there."

Listening to your own voice on a recording is a very strange experience, and I don't like the sound of my own voice. Most people don't. And that's what made this method of training so effective - people were already in that critical "oh-God-that's-my-voice" mindset, and therefore willing to see what problems were there.

The call of mine was pretty good - I got very good at giving the monitoring and recording disclosure as a reflex when answering the phone (my mother had to inform me once that I better NOT be recording her calls), so that part was fine. What amazed me, for someone who was a theatre major and then a teacher for five years, was how uncomfortable and weak I sounded speaking on the phone. I apologized, I ummed, I errrred.....

"She ran you over," he said. "She controlled the conversation the minute that you got on the phone with her. And that's a problem I see with everyone. We're so desperate to hang on to borrowers, we just don't want to let them go, and we'll say anything to keep them on the phone.

"We need to come at this from a position of strength. We control the conversation. The worst they can do is hang up on you, and if they're going to do that, they're not serious about this debt and you are wasting your time talking to them anyway." He turned to me again. "You got a place of employment with that call - can she be garnished?"

"I'm not sure."

He nodded. "Why don't you check on that when you get back out there. If she can be garnished, set her up, and I guarantee she will call you back begging to make payment arrangements when she gets that letter."

He looked at everyone else. "That said, don't start in with the garnishment on first contact. As a matter of fact, I don't even want to hear the word 'garnishment' on a first contact. Some of you have the opposite issue in that you're scaring people off. Don't show your ace on the first throw. Cause if you scream garnishment in the first breath, when you take that statement of finances, they're not going to tell you where they work. And we need all the information we can get in case they fall out of a program three months down the road."

He thought for a moment. "You know, you can even ask them straight up at the beginning of the call if this is something they have good intentions about. After you tell them what the call's about, what the balance of the loan is, ask them straight up if they have good intentions about it. Do they intend to pay it back? If the answer's no, then that's really the end of the call and you just follow up with a garnishment if you have their employer, or their taxes will get seized. Nothing you can do. If the answer's yes...that's something you can always get back to if they're giving you issues with references and financial info. 'You said you have good intentions.'"

We went through everyone else's phone calls, and most people were in the same position I was - weak, letting the borrower control the conversation, hesitant to ask for information, lots of umms and errs. He went through a lot of the same talk with other collectors, and them summed up.

"Too many people go in with the mindset that we are 'asking for their money'. We are not asking. Every single borrower in our office signed a piece of paper when they took out these loans stating that if they ever fell into federal default, the balance in full would be due on demand. Any arrangement we are willing to make beyond that is a courtesy. Ask for balance in full. Ask if they can pay if off in thirty days. Let them know this is a serious obligation they need to take care of. We are here to help them if they are serious about taking care of these loans. If they aren't serious, move on to someone who's going to pay you."

What came to mind as I was walking out was a line from "Get Shorty" when John Travolta is explaining 'the look' to Danny DeVito: "What I'm thinking is, I own you. But what I'm NOT doing is feeling one way or another about it. You are a number in my book. That's it."

And that really is the key to success in collections. Being able to hold that mental state - not compassionate, not aggressive monster. Just a hum of "you owe this debt, and we need to settle it". It's just a fact, a number in a book that needs to be resolved, and then we will go on our way and never cross paths again. Whatever the circumstances in the borrower's life (in the case of my phone call, five kids and a useless drunk of a husband), there needs to be resolution.

It is a surprisingly hard mental state to retain. I think I came close to it the month I hit NPV, though I was only able to express it through people in impossible situations that I kept on the phone to get into hardship programs (no bonus money in that direction, Skippy). And perhaps in different personal circumstances I could have held it and eventually hit goal. But it is enough for me that I know, understand, and was capable of it. And to move on.