March 30 is National Doctors Day. The day, signed into law in 1990 is a way to celebrate the enormous sacrifice doctors make in order to become a doctor as well as the financial dedication to get them though school.

As a collection agency serving many in the medical and dental field, we often see doctors who try very hard to ride that fine line of patient care and compassion with trying to get paid. And although many people have health insurance, there are some fees that are either not covered by insurance or the matter of co-payments comes into play.

Whenever we talk to a doctor’s office about assisting them with their medical collections one of their top priorities is to have us treat them the way the office and the doctor would treat them; with care and compassion. They do not like to lose a patient and because there are so many other factors when dealing with collecting on medical debt, we put on our most diplomatic approach we can to help resolve these issues.

Our own Michelle had a chance on a recent trip to Michigan to speak with one of our clients in the medical field about this topic.

Greg DeSana is an extraordinary Collection Manager for American Profit Recovery in our Farmington Hills, Michigan office. His experience in the collection industry has helped him develop the drive to work diligently each day and effectively manage his team. Greg was actually our first collector when we opened our doors. Greg has a history of producing exceptional results that has made APR an effective and reputable collection agency. He graduated from Michigan State University with a Bachelor’s degree in General Business Administration. He went on to acquire skills in the collection industry serving in Credit Management Services for Ford Credit. He brought his knowledge and expertise to APR in May 2005 and enjoys being part of a team that looks to make raise the bar in the collection industry.

Check out our own Michelle interviewing Greg recently.

Meet Mike Hiller, an exceptional Collection Manager at American Profit Recovery who has helped build a top-notch team and is setting the bar high though his actions and attention to detail. Mike joined APR’s Farmington Hills, Michigan office in 2005 and is dedicated each day to making APR the best collection agency in the industry. With diplomacy, compliance and building a first rate team as his goals, he is one of the stars of this industry.

He earned his undergraduate degree from Central Michigan University while also being involved in their Leadership Program. He also achieved a Master’s Degree in Psychology from the University of Detroit Mercy. (Comes in pretty handy here…) Following graduation he was hired as a Sales Associate with Coca Cola and Nabisco then went on to work as a Crew Manager with H&H Contracting. Both positions helped Mike cultivate his recruiting, training and management talents.

It’s at this collection agency that his skills shine and those skills help us hire and retain the best talent and resolve debt diplomatically with consumers.

Mike’s experience in the collection industry and personal penchant for helping others through volunteer work and charitable events make him an incredible part of the APR team. Take a look at this short video bio of him.

While we take the business of being a collection agency seriously, we take treating everyone with respect and dignity just as seriously. That includes consumers, clients, employees, vendors and everyone that comes in contact with us. Last year we took the Collectors Pledge that simply states we will do our best to not only treat everyone with respect but to help consumers pay their debts. That means we don’t just collect that debt; we help them resolve it.

An aggressive approach just doesn’t work in this business. Not only that; the businesses that hire us to help them collect on their receivables just don’t want it. They want us to be diplomatic and in the end, help them retain their customers.

We are reminded daily of our pledge, spearheaded by the Association of Credit and Collection Professionals and all of our team members have the pledge they signed displayed at their desks.

I’d like to ask you for 30 seconds of your time and watch the video below of the commitment this collection agencyhas to consumers and business.

A few helpful tips on how you can improve your internal AND external recovery rates!

1. Keep your records up to date.
- Ask for updated and additional contact information from long standing customers. Are you asking for alternate phone numbers, social security numbers, and employment information? All of this will help with both collecting the bill AND in reporting the correct consumers to the credit bureaus.

2.Ask for payment up front and have clear payment guidelines.
- Explain expected payment terms in advance.
- Make sure you get something in writing if payment is not received in advance.
- If you have not had your existing contract reviewed, please call your CSR today so we can take a peek!

3. Have an Accounts Receivable Process and stick to it!
- Manage your account based on their age vs. your feelings.
- Bill regularly.
- Turn accounts over to Tier I as soon as they have gone past due; generally 45-90 days.

4. Train all staff on how to handle calls.
- Take advantage of APR’s complimentary training and have your staff sign up to be trained on how to handle calls.
- Using APR’s suggested scripts or create your own scripts and keep them accessible for your staff to use when handling consumer calls.

5. Provide American Profit Recovery with thorough accurate information.
- Make sure you include any additional contact information that may be helpful in the collection process.
- You never know what tidbit or fact will get your bill collected. Information is power. The more you give us the more we can help you!

As always, our Customer Service team is here and available to answer any questions you have on APRweb, our program, or anything above! Never be afraid to call (877) 634-8900!

We are introducing you to our managers in the next couple of weeks so you can get a better idea of the talent we have here at American Profit Recovery. First up;  Melissa Mallia, Administrative Team Manager and Team Leader for all employee activities and charitable events in American Profit Recovery’s Farmington, Hills Michigan office. Melissa’s team is responsible for all the back end activities here at APR.  Our admin department allows all of us to focus on the client and providing the best service we can to all that entrust us with their business.

Melissa is also instrumental in organizing APR’s Michigan team for the annual Making Strides for Breast Cancer Walk along with securing donations for the Adopt a Family Program that this collection agency sponsors each holiday season. She also leads the Michigan team in their annual Employee Week which gives APR staff a break from their regular routines by presenting a work week filled with fun activities.

Take a look at this short video and meet Melissa;

APR offered me the very unique opportunity last week of attending a breakfast seminar with Mark Kruger from Season 5 of The Biggest Loser. The Marlborough Chamber of Commerce hosted this event and Partner Jeff DiMatteo, Sales Rep Andy Robinson and myself took an hour out of our morning to listen to his motivational and educational speech.

Mark, Andy, Me and Jeff

Jeff, Andy and I arrived to a breakfast buffet of eggs, bacon, potatoes and carbs upon carbs. Needless to say I took a big chunk of fruit to hide my big chunk of bacon as I was sure I’d be scolded right away. The breakfast was great and I was grateful for the opportunity to get out of the office, network and learn some new health tips! Some of my favorite that Mark shared included:

1) Eat something within the first 45 minutes of waking up. He said our bodies are like locomotives … once they get going they don’t stop – but they need fuel to get going! Who doesn’t like being told to eat?
2) Do something 30 minutes a day. He broke our days into 48 – 30 minute slots and asked who couldn’t find 1/48th of their day to get some sort of exercise. His 30 minutes are found at 4:30am … I’ll stick to my 1pm lunch break.
3) Keep a journal of what you eat. He said if you hold yourself accountable and see what you are putting in your body daily – change will come.
4) Always have a goal. Mark told us that what has kept him going is always having an upcoming race … whether it be 5K or 100 miles which he is running in Vermont this year – always having a reason to keep going and keep training has kept him in the gym and kept his weight off.
5) And I quote … scales are like men. They cheat and they lie. No comment needed here – just a little humor.

What I appreciated most about the day and the days since is that APR actually wanted me to get out of the office and attend this event even though it took time out of my work day. And every day since, my boss Jeff has given me a little motivation (guilt) if I don’t head out with my gym bag at 1pm. It’s not every day that you find a manager or a company that wants to consistenly make you better and give you the tools you need to do so in every part of your life.

Just another way I profit from our difference … I only hope the tips above can help you too!

Once again, we are tackling the issue of the credit report. We have discussed this many times and yes, we’ll keep talking about it because it’s an important tool in your financial stability and if you’re not careful in watching this, you could be starring down the path of things you never imagined., Working at various levels of a collection agency for over 20 years, I have seen many cases of individuals and businesses for that matter getting into unnecessary situations of adverse credit issues because of human error or criminal activity such as various levels of identity theft. As I mentioned before, pulling your credit report on a regular basis is essential to keeping tabs on your financial life.

So you pulled your credit report from all three agencies; TransUnion (www.transunion.com ), Equifax (www.equifax.com), and Experian (http://www.experian.com). Now what?

Well if you didn’t see anything that isn’t yours, you could be all set. Congratulations. If you found some errors or even worse, credit entries that are just outright wrong, you have a little work to do. Here are some of the things you should be looking for when you review your credit report;

-          accounts marked delinquent from collection agencies or an original creditor

-          credit lines that you may have applied for long ago and have forgotten about

-          requests for credit that you did not initiate (this could mean that are a victim of identity theft)

I f you find items that are incorrect, inaccurate or are just not yours, you need to act quickly. Don’t wait. Dispute those items immediately with the credit bureau. Federal law states that you can dispute these inaccuracies for free so do it. Once you do that, the credit bureau will contact the source of the data and then hopefully solve you issue although I have heard cases of these disputes depending on who you’re dealing with takes some time. But hang in there. This is your financial life we’re talking about.

Also, as many cases of uncovered identity theft, if you feel you have been the victim of this, you need to visit  www.consumer.gov/idtheft to find out your rights and other methods of resolving that issue.

Did you know its National Consumer Protection Week? I have some advice in that spirit.

I know we have gone over this before but it’s such an important topic that I feel it’s necessary to keep it in front of you. Pulling your credit report is an essential part of securing your financial future.  Reviewing your credit in full to see who might have pulled your credit, looking for signs of identity theft and taking quick action to clean up any mistakes are vital to maintaining good credit and a good credit score.

You should be checking your credit report on a regular basis to ensure that there are no signs of identity theft and that nothing negative has been erroneously posted to your credit.  As you know, your credit report and credit score are what lenders use to determine IF you get a loan and what type of interest rates you get.  The better your score, the better chances of being approved and the better rate you generally get.

So, once again, I remind you of the following;

If you see signs of identity theft such as entries that are clearly not yours, have them fixed immediately. If there are errors in your report that you spot, call and or write and have them corrected ASAP. Stay on top of this. You may need to be persistent.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act is the Federal Law which protects you and your credit.  Under this law, you are entitled to a free copy of your credit report from each of the nationwide consumer reporting agencies once every 12 months.  Addition reports from the agencies can then be purchased.  You can also go to sites such as; www.annualcreditreport.com or freecreditreport.com  to pull all three of your reports. It’s not enough to pull just one. They can drastically differ depending on who’s reporting to these so pull them all.

You can also pull them individually; The three major nationwide credit reporting agencies are again for your reference; TransUnion (www.transunion.com ), Equifax (www.equifax.com), and Experian (http://www.experian.com).

You can pull your report one time every 12 months for free. In fact, my advice is to pull a different one every four months. That way you are checking in on your credit every four months instead of once a year.

It may be strange for me to say this but there are many people who are needlessly sent to a collection agency because of poor record keeping and because the consumer did not keep up on these important issues that can affect them for years to come. Keep and eye on your credit report and you may just find your financial life improving with just a few tweaks.

More to come on credit reporting soon…

Going to trade shows is always fun. You get to meet new people face-to-face, hear their stories and listen to their experiences as a business owner.

At the MGIA show, a lot of the lawn care and landscaping owners faced a very similar problem. They perform good, hard work and often times don’t get paid for their services. They are already out the labor and product, and they are now having to spend their time, money and effort trying to collect on unpaid bills.

At the show, we heard from a lot of owners that thought they might be too small for a collection agency to help them. They had been turned down before by typical collection agencies that charge the 30-50% because their balances were too small, or they only run into a dozen or so customers that go delinquent in a given year. It was great to be able to tell these guys “not only can we help your business, but you are actually a great fit for what we do.” We got to tell them that we specialize in many different types of industries, but the green industry is one of our best. A lot of them were excited to hear this, but were still hesitant about using a collection agency.

Sure they wanted to get paid, who doesn’t? But, they were still concerned with alienating their customers. They wanted to know how to get the money in the door, but also how to keep the customer for next season or even to finish out the one they are currently servicing. These guys were very relieved to hear of our diplomatic Tier I program that is geared to increase cash flow, reduce internal costs and to act as an intermediary between owner and customer. By opening up lines of communication it actually helps them keep their customer!

Our advice to them, and to all lawn care and landscaping companies is the same – get something in place now before the spring and summer seasons. It will help you get a system down for your office so you aren’t overwhelmed with delinquent accounts in the fall and winter.  And, most importantly, it will get you paid.