Industry: Higher Education
Location: Morocco
Results: Local Moroccan office successfully traced student and negotiated a large settlement on a 2-year-old tuition account; assisted with Moroccan bank petition to ensure payment.
Background:
An international student defaulted on a tuition account and disappeared.
The US school spent two years from the charge date attempting to collect the amount in-house with no results before placing the account with Cedar Financial’s international education debt collection team.
The Challenge:
The client could not get hold of the unresponsive international student, sinking valuable time and resources into the recovery efforts and leaving tens of thousands of dollars uncollected.
Once the student was located by our office, difficulties with the bank in Morocco made receiving payment a challenge.
How Cedar Financial Solved the Problem:
Cedar Financial’s international skip trace team immediately stepped in and located the student living in Morocco.
We assigned the account to our Morocco debt collection office in the student’s location and issued a local demand notice. Our local Moroccan collectors were able to start a conversation with the student and request a face-to-meeting to resolve the account.
Realizing that the issue wasn’t going away, the student offered a settlement to close the account in full. We worked diligently to negotiate an acceptable settlement agreement between the school and student, going back and forth with required paperwork.
Moroccan banking issues, solved
Even with a settlement approved, this case wasn’t over.
Since Morocco generally does not allow remits out of the country, Cedar Financial’s team worked closely with the student to complete additional paperwork needed to petition the bank to allow the funds to be sent.
We kept in contact with the student throughout the petition process until, 30 days later, the client received the payment and the account was settled in full.
The Takeaway:
Local experts dramatically increase your chances of recovering debt overseas.
With a powerful network of vetted collectors in over 150 countries, Cedar Financial can help you quickly locate hard-to-find debtors and overcome the many challenges that arise in international debt collection.
