2006RUS

In the town of Cody, Wyoming, 219 utility accounts were sent to collection. Only four of the bills belonged to property owners. Some are thinking that the city believes that holding property owners are responsible for utility costs that their renters left unpaid. A policy like that could have added $180,000 to the city budget during the past five years, and furthermore, other utility users are subsidizing those that do not pay their bills.

Landlords are offering obvious and swift objection, wondering why it should be their job to pay a bill that somebody else was responsible for. Another plan has been suggested however, one that would require a deposit from every person opening up a utility account.

This change in policy would involve a number of modifications like a requirement that a property owner co-sign for a renter’s account. Tenants would be billed under their own account but have an open landlord account for each property. Unpaid bills would be transferred to the landlord’s account if the tenant doesn’t pay.

Deposit requirements would go from $150 to $200, and would be necessary for all accounts, regardless of their past credit history. Property owners would be notified of delinquencies, and they would be encouraged to get in touch with the city to determine if the bill got paid before returning rental deposits. All property owners would have to keep utilities in their names.

People who support the plan claim that it isn’t out of line with what other cities are doing, and it is a simpler and more cost efficient way to collect money. Collection agencies receive about one third of what they collect in the city, and 60 percent of bills that go to collection remain unpaid.

Whatever decision they come to, it should be fast: city officials are noticing a trend toward less people making deposits and more accounts being sent to collection agencies.

Mallory Megan works for Rapid Recovery solution, a credit collection agency. Our aim is to collect as much of your money as possible.

And you thought your collection agency was bad. It has been revealed in recent news that an Irish gangland boss has found a new calling- debt collection. This criminal progidy has been associated with twelve deaths; a threat even more looming than a collections letter.

Usually, legitimate creditors who aren’t criminals will hire out third party bill collectors to retrieve debts. Collection agencies work on commission, where they receive a portion of the amount of money that they collect. Frequently collection companies will purchase debt from the creditors so that they can collect the whole sum of money owed.

The Irish gang members seemed to have gotten inspiration from this practice, but the similarities end there. The boss of the disreputable Irish gang has created his own collection agency, purchasing debt and using his notoriety to bully his way into gathering the money owed. The unlucky debtors are drug users who are unable to repay dealers.

Legitimate collection agencies will normally start with a mild “reminder letter.” If the person in debt is hostile or evasive, the letters will become more severe. Phone calls are also used as a cue to those who owe money to deliver. If these tactics fail, the agency has the right to report a debt to credit bureaus, or file a lawsuit.

Conversely, the Irish gangland “collection company” will use its authority as a group of cold-blooded murderers and criminals to bully debtors into paying back drug money. Fortunately, the head of this operation has been arrested, and the Justice Minister of Ireland has sworn to do everything in his power to ensure that the accused will be brought to justice.

So next time you get a letter from a collections agency, try to keep things in perspective. And if you are ever in Ireland, it is probably not smart to take out a loan with a notorious gang.

Experiencing trouble collecting credit? Collections can help.

In Dallas, the North Texas Tollway Authority, an entity responsible for collecting tolls, has been scrutinized for months over its toll collecting policy. This policy charges drivers who do not pay up at the toll booth fines of hundreds, or even thousands, of dollars. Because the NTTA has been under fire in the public eye, it announced today two steps it says that will target improving customer satisfaction.

The first measure that the NTTA took was to allow all drivers to utilize the electronic toll collection lanes, including those who do not have one. They can do this without being punished with a twenty five dollar fine.

Before this measure, drivers without toll tags that utilized the electronic lanes on the Dallas North Tollway were seen at as violators and would be fined twenty five dollars for each time they passed through an electronic toll booth, rather than a cash booth after the fact.

However, after February eighth, the drivers lacking a toll tag who use the electronic lanes will be given the opportunity to pay for the tolls before being slammed with the additional twenty five dollar fine. But these toll charges will continue to be calculated at the cash rate, which is twice as high as the rates paid by toll tag consumers.

However, the change will not affect the NTTA’s collections policy in any other way and it will not prevent customers without toll tags who don’t pay toll bills mailed to their homes from being charged twenty five dollars for every unpaid toll. This is a policy that can turn a week’s worth of tolls into a thousand dollar bill.

The NTTA’s second measure was to appoint an internal auditor as a mediator of some sort, which will be on hand to help frustrated customers who have first complained their way through NTTA customer service hierarchy without a result that they deemed to be satisfactory. The auditor will then review the account and determine if customer service and billing reps have followed their own rules.

Mallory Megan works for Rapid Recovery Solution, a third party collection agency. Looking for credit card services or skip tracing? Contact us today.