Industry:B2C, Credit and Loan Institution

Location: Purchase, NY

Results: 

Background:

American company faces difficulty calling out to their international student debtors

A credit and banking company based in NY had no issues contacting their domestic debtors but lacked the bandwidth to make collection efforts for students living overseas. 

The Challenge:

Getting in contact with debtors outside the US 

Contacting debtors internationally can greatly complicate the collection process. Between locating the debtors, time zone differences and language barriers, the process can be overwhelming. 

 Our client was doing fine collecting from students domestically but didn’t have the ability to contact international insolvents. With our expertise, we have been able to contact and collect successfully from students overseas. 

How Cedar Financial Solved the Problem:

Thanks to our expertise in international collections, Cedar Financial has been able to successfully collect for our client internationally by: 

1) Student Outreach Program 

Our Student Outreach Program gave students the opportunity to come out of delinquency before going into full collections. This program allowed students to get back on track with payments, which is a better outcome than full collections.  

 Having the bandwidth to increase the number of contact attempts took the weight off the client while making continued progress with the students. 

 Our 78% success rate saved our client the fees of full collections for many accounts, while drastically reducing her year-over-year balances. 

2) Placing collection attempts in the jurisdiction of the debtor

Making contact with the student in their country eliminated language and time zone barriers, making it much easier to get in touch with and collect.  

 Once the accounts were in the same location as the student, collection became not only easier, but also faster. 

 This relieved our client of the need to make phone calls at inconvenient times in-house, and the need to speak or write in a language that is foreign to them.

3) Skip –Tracing

Skip-tracing allowed us to find and contact many students who did not respond to our outreach. This, in turn, greatly increased the amount we were able to collect for our client.  

 We sent our client skip-tracing reports that included information such as location, email and associated company history so they would be able to see the progress being made. This enabled them to have a first-hand view of who had been contacted, and who we were still in the process of locating. 

The Takeaway:

Local leverage can make the difference between success and failure

Early prevention is key in collection. Giving people the option to get out of delinquency rather than going straight to collections has significant benefits for the client as well as the debtor.  

 For the client, it saves time and money. Collections happen sooner, they escape agency fees, and reduce year-over-year balances. 

 For the debtor, coming out of delinquency gives them the chance to get back on track without further harming their credit. 

 When debtors are international, having agents on their home ground who understand the local language and laws makes the process much easier, again saving time and money. 

With over 300 local offices in over 170 countries worldwide, Cedar Financial offers on-the-ground representation in your debtor’s location for faster resolution of your accounts.

If your debtor still won’t pay, we offer low-cost access to a network of top debt collection attorneys, allowing us to apply the extra pressure needed to reach a settlement in difficult cases without you having to hire anyone else.