Collection Agencies And Customer Satisfaction Survey

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In-House
Debt Collection

Col­lec­tion Agen­cies And Cus­tomer Sat­is­fac­tion Survey

By Dean Kaplan

This is the final arti­cle in our four part series about col­lec­tion agen­cies, credit depart­ments, and inter­nal cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion. In the last arti­cle, we dis­cussed three method­olo­gies to deter­mine what the inter­nal cus­tomers’ expec­ta­tions and needs are from the credit depart­ment. These method­olo­gies included one-on-one con­ver­sa­tions with all inter­nal cus­tomers, meet­ings with groups of inter­nal cus­tomers, and the use of a writ­ten cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion sur­vey. This final arti­cle in the series will look more closely at how to develop the writ­ten cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion survey.

When devel­op­ing your inter­nal cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion sur­vey, you should be col­lect­ing data from your inter­nal cus­tomers rel­a­tive to the credit department’s per­for­mance in three key areas: tech­ni­cal exper­tise (i.e. is the credit depart­ment per­form­ing sat­is­fac­to­rily in man­ag­ing, report­ing and con­trol­ling credit risk, suc­cess­fully col­lect­ing from delin­quent exter­nal cus­tomers, apply­ing cash remit­tances quickly and accu­rately, and resolv­ing cus­tomer deduc­tions and cash dis­counts), per­for­mance of tasks within the big­ger con­text of the orga­ni­za­tion as a whole, and the credit department’s under­stand­ing of the indus­try, econ­omy and technology.

The area of tech­ni­cal exper­tise refers to exper­tise in the key func­tions per­formed by the credit depart­ment. The credit depart­ment should have estab­lished processes in place to man­age credit risk. Sur­vey ques­tions could include how the credit wor­thi­ness of new clients is deter­mined, how mar­ginal accounts are han­dled, what fac­tors are used to revise credit for future orders, how eco­nomic and mar­ket con­di­tions affect the han­dling of credit, etc.

Cre­ate a cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion sur­vey for your Inter­nal Customers

The sur­vey should also include ques­tions about the reports dis­trib­uted by the credit depart­ment relat­ing to credit risk and accounts receiv­able sta­tus. Are the inter­nal cus­tomers of the credit depart­ment receiv­ing the infor­ma­tion they need to do their jobs, is the infor­ma­tion received in a timely man­ner, and is the infor­ma­tion accurate?

Sur­vey ques­tions about accounts receiv­able col­lec­tions should come next. If the credit depart­ment has hired col­lec­tion agen­cies to assist with debt col­lec­tions, the per­for­mance of the col­lec­tion agency should be mea­sured here as well as the inter­nal debt col­lec­tors. Reports of the sta­tus of debt col­lec­tions should be addressed here also. The con­tent, time­li­ness and accu­racy of the report­ing should be included.

When cash remit­tances are received, this infor­ma­tion needs to be sent out to inter­nal cus­tomers imme­di­ately. Are the cash remit­tances posted promptly? Are reports relat­ing to cash remit­tances timely and accu­rate, and is the infor­ma­tion pre­sented in a way that is help­ful and infor­ma­tive to the inter­nal cus­tomers?
Keep­ing track of and respond­ing to cus­tomer cash dis­counts and deduc­tions can be a night­mare. The sur­vey should ask if the credit department’s han­dling of these dis­counts and deduc­tions is timely and reported in an under­stand­able for­mat. Develop ques­tions to deter­mine if any improve­ments need to be made in han­dling or reporting.

Ques­tions relat­ing to how the credit depart­ment oper­ates within the orga­ni­za­tion over­all might include ques­tions about the respon­sive­ness to requests for cus­tomer credit inves­ti­ga­tions, time­li­ness of credit deci­sions, and sup­port­ive­ness to the report­ing needs of inter­nal cus­tomer depart­ments. Tai­lor these ques­tions to glean the infor­ma­tion the credit depart­ment needs to make pos­i­tive changes where needed.

Finally, the sur­vey might include some ques­tions per­tain­ing to the credit department’s knowl­edge of the indus­try, the econ­omy or tech­nol­ogy as they relate to the credit department’s inter­ac­tions with its inter­nal cus­tomers. For exam­ple, it might be help­ful for the credit depart­ment to know that some of its staff is not well-versed in the tech­nol­ogy being used by the com­pany. This might point out the need for fur­ther training.

Devel­op­ment of an inter­nal cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion sur­vey is not sim­ple, but it does not need to be overly com­plex or lengthy. Deter­mine what your inter­nal cus­tomers need and expect from the credit depart­ment, and write your ques­tions to glean mea­sur­able data about these areas. If your ques­tions are spe­cific enough, the infor­ma­tion col­lected should help you fine-tune your credit department’s oper­a­tions to be more effi­cient and pro­vide excel­lent cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion to all inter­nal customers.

Click here to go to the first arti­cle in the series if you hap­pened to miss it Col­lec­tion Agen­cies Work­ing For Credit Depart­ments. Click here if you missed the third arti­cle Col­lec­tion Agen­cies And Inter­nal Cus­tomer Sat­is­fac­tion.

The Kaplan Group is a bou­tique col­lec­tion agency spe­cial­iz­ing in large (over $10,000) debt col­lec­tions due from busi­nesses. Founded in 1991, the com­pany has a stel­lar rep­u­ta­tion (A+ rat­ing with the Bet­ter Busi­ness Bureau) and is rec­og­nized as one of the lead­ing col­lec­tion agen­cies for results on large and com­plex mat­ters.

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