Nationwide
Nationwide Debt Collection Agencies
Most commercial debt collection agencies provide service nationwide. The Kaplan Group is based in California, but the majority of our clients and the majority of the debtor’s we collect from are from outside of California. Debt collection agencies can provide effective nationwide service due to the improvements in communication and information gathering that have occurred over the last 20 years.
Some small debt collection agencies are not effective in providing nationwide service. This is because the debt collectors themselves do not have the experience to effectively use the Internet and subscription data services to gather information and knowledge on debtors.
The primary communication method used by in the commercial collection process is the telephone. Most of our success in collecting money comes from getting the debtor on the phone and making them feel the need to pay. The messages we leave for the debtor when they don’t answer are part of the process. Debtors do not know where we are calling from-they only know that were on the phone. When Mr. Kaplan travels internationally to negotiate deals, he uses Skype to stay in touch with those companies who owe large balances or have committed to immediate payments. Our office phones forward to cell phones so we can make and receive calls even though we aren’t behind her desk. The revolution in communication technology allows debt collection agencies to provide effective services from virtually anywhere.
The Internet has also made it much easier to get specific information from anywhere in the world. At The Kaplan Group, will look at satellite photos to get an idea of the type of building the debtor is located in. We’ll look at street views and then comment to the debtor regarding the signage on their business or their neighbors business as if we had a private investigator do a drive-by. We will use Zillow to get an estimate of the value of someone’s house and compare this to their mortgage to understand the financial pressure or comfort they may be feeling personally as well as the possibility of recovering on a personal guarantee. We are sure that most debt collection agencies do not use these resources and many others that we use here at The Kaplan Group. We stay on the cutting edge of both subscription and free methods for obtaining information on debtors so that we can provide extremely effective results on a nationwide basis.
In addition, we have a nationwide network of debt collection lawyers if litigation is required. These attorneys will work on a contingency basis for The Kaplan Group and our clients. Many other debt collection agencies talk about attorney forwarding services. Our experience has been that these are worthless. We tracked hundreds of claims that were forwarded and saw no results whatsoever. We get exceptional results when we collect under the name of our in house law firm, Law Offices of Anne R. Grupp. This shows that it is the quality of the collection effort, not the location of the collector.
However, when litigation is required, most of the time the litigation must be filed in the location of the debtor. Our nationwide network of debt collection attorney’s provides this service. We are very selective on which claims we believe should go to court. Using this criteria, we collect money on more than 50% of the lawsuits we file. When we do not collect money, the reason in over 80% of those cases is that the companies go out of business before we have a chance to collect on the judgment.