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The ACA International’s annual Conference and Expo is always enjoyable for PDCflow. We get to meet new people, connect with current clients, and see what’s trending in the industry. This year, PDCflow’s Product Management Analyst Matt Thomas spoke to many attendees about their wants, needs, and expectations for the technology that helps them run their businesses.
A central theme running through the convention was the desire for new ways to communicate with consumers and the legal implications of using them.
Many credit and collection agencies are still sending authorization documents and requesting payments through the mail. But evolving technology has provided quicker, simpler alternatives, and collectors are catching on. By adopting new digital tools, agencies can keep in touch with consumers through their preferred channels, decrease collection time, increase authorization success rates, and shrink office operation costs.
Text Messages and Email
Text message and email are the preferred methods of contact for consumers as long as they are careful to conform to all the requirements related to debtor communications. Encouraging figures on text message communication show why it is becoming so sought after by collectors:
- Text message communications boast 94% open rates.
- Text messages receive a response within first 6-7 minutes of being sent.
With numbers like this, it’s no wonder ACA attendees were interested in text messaging. Collectors are also sensing the money-saving potential of document delivery and electronic signatures. Sending and receiving payment authorizations to fulfill Regulation E is essential to for payment compliance. Using an eSignature tool can allow agencies to go paperless, reducing mailing costs and shortening the time between authorization and collection of a payment.
Office Efficiency
Newfound optimism in the industry has afforded collectors more time concentrating on the solutions that will make their office processes more efficient. Software companies (like PDCflow) have spent much time and effort on making regulation compliance simple within our products. And agencies are taking note.
“I saw a larger number of collectors interested in the big picture of a software’s capabilities,” says Thomas. “More agencies are starting to care about maximizing efficiency through just a few office tools instead of a patchwork of solutions.”
What does this mean? Technology that can improve the efficiency of collections has been around for a while. With recent advances they are becoming an essential part of running and managing a successful agency. Staying on top of the latest developments and most advanced, popular and efficient communication methods can boost productivity and profitability.
