Archives for May 2020

This video is part of the iA Think Differently series. Written by or recorded with members of the iA Innovation Council, the series showcases thought leadership in analytics, communications, payments, and compliance technology for the accounts receivable management industry.

—

Today I’m talking with Ray Peloso, CEO of Katabat, a Wilmington, Delaware-based enterprise debt collection software platform. It can be a standalone solution, or it can complement existing systems and technologies by adding digital omnichannel capability. As a digital solutions provider, their phone has been ringing amidst the pandemic. When I asked about how he is thinking differently today, he said it’s all about speed. Those days of spending months or years developing or making your case? That strategy today will leave you behind.

[Editor’s note: If you are interested in topics like strategy, testing and scenario planning, you should not miss insideARM’s next conference, iA Strategy & Tech – a completely virtual event – July 21-23. It’s a masterclass in collections strategy.]

Transcript

The iA Innovation Council is a collaborative working group of product, tech, strategy, and operations thought leaders at the forefront of analytics, communications, payments, and compliance technology. Group members meet in person (and lately, virtually) several times each year to engage in substantive dialogue and whiteboard sessions with the creative thinkers behind the latest innovations for the industry, the regulators who audit and establish guardrails for new technology, and educators, entrepreneurs and innovators from outside the industry who inspire different thinking. 

2020 members include:

[article_ad]

In the not-too-distant past, FDCPA litigation was a no-loss game for plaintiff’s counsel. That is no longer the case, thanks to a pioneering debt collection agency—ERC—that has taken a stand against hyper-technical and baseless FDCPA claims, and gone after plaintiffs’ counsel who engage in such litigation schemes. Back in March, ERC won a sanctions motion against plaintiff and her counsel in Connecticut for a whopping $41,871.95. Yesterday, ERC won a motion for attorneys fees and costs, winning back nearly $37,000 in its attorney fees and costs.

[article_ad]

A call baiting claim we’ve all seen before

If your agency has seen FDCPA lawsuits and threats of suit in New York, you’re likely not a stranger to the facts established here. Plaintiff engaged a “credit specialist” named Tawanda Fraizer, who called ERC on plaintiff’s behalf. On the call, the credit specialist stated plaintiff wanted to dispute, and asked if the plaintiff needed to submit the dispute in writing. ERC accepted the oral dispute, but informed plaintiff she would also need to submit the dispute in writing.

Plaintiff then filed a lawsuit—which, according to the court, “[cited] statutes of dubious applicability”—with two FDCPA claims. First, that ERC didn’t “affirmatively notify” the credit bureaus of her dispute. Second, that requesting plaintiff to send her dispute in writing was a false representation since she had a right to dispute orally. 

Stonewalling during litigation

During the litigation process, plaintiff’s side stonewalled discovery. The credit specialist refused to comply with a subpoena, and plaintiff’s counsel refused to allow ERC to depose the plaintiff. After ERC moved to extend the discovery period to depose plaintiff, plaintiff’s counsel offered to voluntarily dismiss the case—which ERC rejected. 

The judge ordered plaintiff and her counsel to appear at a status conference to figure out what was going on. According to the court: 

At the evidentiary hearing, Plaintiff was surprised to learn that a federal case in her name was currently pending before this Court. Her testimony revealed that she had no involvement in bringing the case, other than signing an initial retainer whose true purpose she did not understand. She was not aware of any discovery requests, or of interrogatories which were answered in her name. Plaintiff also admitted that she had no reason to dispute her debt. She simply fell behind on payments and wanted her credit repaired. 

The credit specialist was deposed by ERC in another case, and the court found the nature of the scheme:

Frazier’s Eisner testimony, which this Court accepts in accordance with Fed. R. Evid. 804(b)(1), reveals her close working relationship with the Rephen Firm. Following a script, Frazier would call debt collectors and ask them leading questions to elicit violations of the FDCPA. She would dispute the account in every instance, irrespective of any justification to do so. Conversations containing purported violations were then funneled to the Rephen Firm.

The parties agreed to dismiss the case with prejudice if ERC was permitted to move for attorneys’ fees. And that is the basis of the instant order.

Court grants attorney fees to ERC

While the court noted that FDCPA sanctions are typically applied to plaintiff’s misbehavior, this case warrants “application of the statute consistent with reality” by sanctioning plaintiff’s counsel.

According to the court, plaintiff’s counsel—not plaintiff—brought this case. Plaintiff had no idea a lawsuit was being filed. The court states, “[plaintiff’s] lawyers brought it without her participation, and in spite of the fact that she was not subjected to any abusive debt collection practices by debt collectors that the FDCPA was designed to eradicate.”

The court then went to find that in a situation like this—where an attorney brings a case without the client’s knowledge or involvement—sanctions under the FDCPA may be brought against the attorneys involved.

Below are a few more quotes from the court’s decision which show that the Eastern District of New York is smartening up to these types of schemes:

[The Rephen Firm brought this case] with the purpose of extracting a monetary award from the Defendant, for a harm its client did not suffer.Such behavior is not merely “harassment.” It is, without making a “fortress out of the dictionary,” more than annoyance or unwelcome conduct. It is nothing less than an attempt to transform a consumer protection statute into an ATM machine.

(Internal citation omitted.)

The Rephen Firm’s strategy was to use burdensome litigation to induce a quick settlement. When Defendant refused to settle and instead pushed for discovery, the Rephen Firm offered to dismiss the case rather than produce its client for deposition. At no point did it show any interest—or, indeed, have any interest—in prosecuting this case to vindicate Plaintiff’s rights.

As if this wasn’t enough, the court also went to find that the claims in the complaint are “entirely without legal support.”

insideARM Perspective

Y’all, the tide is changing. Fighting back works.

Shelly Gensmer, VP of Legal and Compliance at ERC, states, “This has been a long-fought battle against plaintiff’s attorney and his firm. The team put in many long hours of research trying to piece this one together so we could effectively illustrate the behavior of this firm and bring it to the attention of the court. ERC is not at all surprised at the award given the facts of the case. Of course we are very pleased and hope this win is just one more to help tip the scales in the right direction for our industry.”

—

Want to find out which other plaintiff’s counsel/firms have been called out by courts for questionable behabior? The iA Case Law Tracker can help you do that in less time than it takes to pour your morning cup of coffee.

In a memorandum released yesterday, Connecticut extended its no-action position regarding branch licensing for those who are temporarily working from home during the pendency of the COVID-19 pandemic. The extension now goes through June 30, 2020. 

Connecticut initially issued this relaxed policy on March 9, 2020. It was first extended on April 16, 2020 to run through May 31, 2020. The current revised memorandum is the second extension. 

MUNCIE, Ind. — Ontario Systems, a leading provider of enterprise software that automates complex workflows and accelerates revenue recovery for clients in the healthcare, government, and accounts receivable management (ARM) markets, announced the acquisition of SwervePay®, an innovative payment facilitator in the ARM and healthcare industries. The acquisition of SwervePay offers Ontario Systems customers a simplified consumer payment engagement platform that helps drive revenue, reduce operational costs, and improve compliance.

Electronic payment processing is becoming an increasingly critical function for Ontario Systems customers. SwervePay consolidates the complicated multivendor environment, simplifies the underwriting and onboarding process, and shortens the funding cycle. With the new platform, Ontario Systems can unify payment processing for the nearly $35 billion in payments managed by the company’s software each year.

“The market is ripe for innovation, and we have an ongoing focus on evolving into a SaaS platform to help our 1,200 clients accelerate revenue and decrease operating costs through frictionless payments, efficient processes, and increased business intelligence,” said Tim O’Brien, Ontario Systems CEO. “The acquisition of SwervePay is our first step toward aggressively transforming legacy on-premise software solutions into an end-to-end SaaS solution to automate revenue recovery processes and drive consumer payments. Looking ahead, we’re positioned to develop new products with greater speed, gain network insights, and further connect to the evolving ecosystem around us.”

SwervePay’s consumer-friendly electronic payment solution makes payments easy and requires no app download or portal sign-in. Key capabilities include text-to-pay, same-day settlement options for ACH and credit cards, and account balance automated messages.

“The most important part of the accounts receivable operation is completing the final step—capturing and processing the payment—as smoothly as possible,” said Jaeme Adams, Vice President, Payments at Ontario Systems and former SwervePay CEO. “Together, Ontario Systems and SwervePay will remove an unnecessary point of complexity in the receivables process by unifying the workflow, consumer communications, and revenue capturing tools into one streamlined platform.”

This announcement comes on the heels of Ontario Systems’ acquisition by New Mountain Capital and the launch of Artiva Magnify™, a flagship product, in 2019. For more information about Ontario Systems, its offerings, and the markets it serves, please visit www.ontariosystems.com.

About Ontario Systems

Established in 1980, Ontario Systems is a leading provider of enterprise software designed to automate complex workflows and accelerate revenue for clients in the healthcare industry as well as federal, state, and local governments and the accounts receivable management (ARM) market. Headquartered in Muncie, Ind., with additional offices in Vancouver, Wash., and Albuquerque, N.M., Ontario Systems offers a full portfolio of end-to-end accounts receivable management solutions including the Artiva® family of products, RevQ®, Ontario Omni®, and SwervePay®, a single-source payment engagement platform. Ontario Systems serves thousands of customers processing nearly $35 billion in patient, constituent, and consumer payments each year.

To learn more about Ontario Systems, visit www.ontariosystems.com or www.justicesystems.com.

Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared on the TrueAccord Blog and is republished here with permission.

—

The Northern District of California has confirmed what the law makes clear: a debt collector may send the initial communication by email (except in New York).

In Greene v. TrueAccord, Case No. 19-cv-06651 (N.D. Cal. May 19, 2020), the Plaintiff claimed the initial email she received and opened violated the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) and the Electronic Signatures in Global Commerce Act (E-SIGN) because she never consented to receive email from TrueAccord.

As the District Court made clear, consent is not a factor when an initial communication contains the validation notice in the body of the email. Only one week after final submissions on the motion to dismiss the Complaint, the District Court dismissed the case with prejudice also finding TrueAccord’s validation notice met the requirements of the law and TrueAccord’s emails sent during the 30-day validation period did not overshadow the initial demand.

[article_ad]

Sending the initial communication and validation notice by email

A debt collector must provide a consumer with a notice about how to dispute an account.  The law states the notice must be given either in the initial communication or in writing within 5 days of that first communication.  The FDCPA does not state what methods a collector can use to provide the validation notice in the initial communication—it only indicates that a “communication” is conveying information about a debt through any medium.  Many debt collectors have hesitated to use email and other modern forms of communications that consumers prefer because these modes are not addressed in the FDCPA.  

In this case, Plaintiff argued that TrueAccord violated the FDCPA by sending the validation notice in an initial communication by email without the consumer’s consent.  Plaintiff argued that TrueAccord did not follow the E-SIGN Act, which outlines the requirements for obtaining consent to email documents to a consumer that must be provided in writing.  

However, as the Court recognized, the E-Sign Act applies to notices that must be provided in writing.  Under the FDCPA, the validation notice is not required to be provided in writing if it is given in the initial communication.  Since TrueAccord provided the validation notice in the body of the initial communication, E-SIGN does not apply.  The Court ruled TrueAccord properly delivered the validation notice in the body of the initial email.

“The Court also agreed with the CFPB’s proposal on the fact that the subject line should contain the name of the creditor and one additional piece of information about the debt other than the amount.”

The Court, in finding that an initial communication can be made electronically, pointed to the fact that “a communication” is broadly defined and can be sent across any medium. Additionally, the Court pointed out that despite amending the FDCPA in 2006 Congress has not made any effort to amend the statute to account for newer communication technologies that have developed.  The Court also recognized the CFPB’s proposed rulemaking permits a validation notice as part of an initial communication in the body of an email. 

The Court explained that when using email to send the initial communication the notice must be reasonably conveyed to the consumer. This requires the notice to appear in the body of the email—not in an attachment where it could be “hidden from the eyes” of the consumer. 

The Court also agreed with the CFPB’s proposal on the fact that the subject line should contain the name of the creditor and one additional piece of information about the debt other than the amount. This ensures “the consumer’s attention is focused on the email . . . as many . . . make decisions to read, ignore, or delete emails on the basis of the subject line.” 

While TrueAccord’s subject line did not contain this information (it read “This needs your attention”), the Plaintiff received the email and opened it.  While the Court noted that the subject line did not convey that the purpose of the email was to collect a debt, the Plaintiff still opened the email with the validation notice in the body.  Therefore, Plaintiff had no standing to make an argument that the subject misled her from opening and receiving the notice when she actually opened it. 

Use of the term “send” instead of “mailed”

Plaintiff also argued that the validation notice in the body of the email was incorrect and misleading because the statute reads “a copy of such verification . . . will be mailed to the consumer.” Yet, the notice in TrueAccord’s email used the word “send” instead of the word “mailed.” 

When evaluating whether or not a collection communication violates the FDCPA, Courts use the “least sophisticated consumer standard.”  This standard is designed to protect all consumers in the spirit of the FDCPA, not just the consumer who filed a lawsuit.  

In looking at the challenged language under this least sophisticated consumer standard, the Court held that there is no requirement for a validation notice to track the language of the statute verbatim.  The Court stated that: 

“…the fact that TrueAccord’s notice departed from the statutory language could not plausibly have deceived or misled the least sophisticated consumer reading the notice.” 

Instead, the consumer would understand from the use of the word “send” that a copy of the verification could be physically mailed or electronically mailed; as the Court noted, electronic mailing of validation documents is permitted in compliance with the E-SIGN Act.

Subsequent email communications did not overshadow the validation notice

Plaintiff also claimed that multiple demands for payment during the thirty-day validation period violated the FDCPA because these emails overshadowed the initial communication containing the validation notice.  The FDCPA protects consumers from collection efforts and communications sent during the thirty-day validation period that overshadow the consumer’s right to dispute.  Typically, communications that demand immediate payment or offer deadlines prior to the expiration of the thirty days constitute overshadowing.

In dismissing Plaintiff’s theory, the Court found that the FDCPA does not put any limits on the number of times a debt collector can communicate with a consumer during the validation period.  The Court noted that while it is possible that the number and timing of communications sent to a consumer could be relevant in an evaluation of whether the communications overshadow the notice, the number of communications in this case—seven within a 30day period—is not excessive. 

The Court also looked at the content of all these emails.  The emails clearly conveyed that TrueAccord would like a payment. They did not include:

• Language requiring a payment
• Language suggesting that a payment should be made prior to the expiration of the 30-day validation period

The Court noted there was no real expression of urgency and all emails had a prominent out of statute disclosure stating that, because of the age of the debt, the creditor will not sue Plaintiff or report it to a credit reporting agency.  By taking this “non-threatening content” of the communications in consideration with the number of emails sent, the Court did not find it plausible that the least sophisticated consumer could be misled or that the emails overshadowed the validation notice.

What lessons can we learn from this case?

Greene is only the second case ever to evaluate how to properly provide the validation notice by email.  It provides good guidance to follow:

• Placing the notice in the body of the email, not behind a password or through a link with seven steps to download (like in LaVallee) and
• Including the name of the creditor and one additional piece of information in the subject line. This step brings the consumer’s attention to the initial email as relating to the debt (this is also forthcoming in the CFPB rule).

Greene is also the first case ever to evaluate the content of email communications sent during the validation period.  It provides good guidance to follow regarding appropriate tone, frequency, and payment requests.  Of interest, the Court noted that TrueAccord included a “Dispute this Debt” link on all emails.  The Court felt that it’s smaller font size and placement at the footer of the emails “buried” the link; but ultimately that fact:

“…did not mean that the original validation notice ha[d] been overshadowed, particularly given the specific facts before the Court.”  

The text appeared in the footer of all emails, along with our mailing address, phone number, office hours, and Privacy Policy.  

Email is a core part of an omnichannel, digital collection strategy, but it doesn’t evolve overnight. It’s important that you have the experience and infrastructure in place to send and deliver emails on a mass scale so that they’re delivered to the consumer’s inbox. Cases like this are shaping the future of digital debt collection practices and how consumers interact with their debts. 

—

Debt collection case law is changing rapidly–want to keep up? The iA Case Law Tracker does that in less time than it takes to pour your morning cup of coffee.

This article is part of the iA Think Differently series. Written by members of the iA Innovation Council, the series showcases thought leadership in analytics, communications, payments, and compliance technology for the accounts receivable management industry.

—

“Uber your business before it gets Kodak-ed.”-ANONYMOUS”

Here is what we know for sure, the collection agency of the future will not look like today’s collection agency. Heck, it won’t look like the collection agency of 2019 thanks to COVID-19. Who knew we could effectively have collection agents work from home? There will be short-term and long-term changes like the ones mentioned in Amy Perkin’s article “Immediate Collection Strategy Solutions for the Impacts of COVID-19“. Change is nothing new for debt collection agencies because we have always been evolving. Looking at the history of debt collection shows us this is true.

Collection agencies used to be local with door to door collection agents and most used index cards to track their accounts. Once American households readily adopted landlines, we saw a change from local collections to regional call centers and the use of phone calls as the primary way of communicating with consumers. We evolved once again by using computer collection systems, dialers, analytics, and the explosion of mega call centers. So, you see, the collection industry has always been changing and evolving and now is no different. What has changed is the speed of change, an unwillingness to act without certainty (regulatory approval), and consumers now controlling their communication preferences.

[article_ad]

There are countless articles about right party contacts dropping, price compression, increasing litigation costs, and regulatory changes driving market uncertainty. These are real, and they are our reality. What we don’t see in debt collection are a lot of articles on listening to what consumers are telling us and then giving consumers what they want. This consumer focus is happening in every industry, but not ours. Other industries have figured it out, “All things being equal, the customer will gravitate toward the option that is easiest to use.”^[1]. 

In debt collection, if you say you are an organization that embraces technology and you are comparing yourself to your competitors, you are missing most of the technology that consumers are demanding. The technology that makes it easy for them. Some of these include, in no particular order:

• 24/7 365 days responses to their inquiries
• The ability to communicate on a channel of their choice
• The ability to switch channels multiple times during the same conversation
• Authentication that happens only once, ever, for that consumer
• Self-service for everything;
  • Payments including the ability to change payment dates and amounts
  • Dispute handling including validation within seconds
  • Updating information especially communication preferences
  • The ability to tie a payment account to their account where the payment will not run until the money is available, and
• Continually updating information.

In other words, they want everything that makes it convenient for them to do business with you. “People are more powerful, skeptical, and impatient today than they’ve ever been. They want what they want now through the device they have at hand now. People are extremely demanding these days, and it’s only going to get worse.”^[2] We have not given the consumer a reason to engage with us in a meaningful way because our communications tend to be one-way. Therefore, we need to start thinking about engaging in a two-way conversation that is no longer dependent on the consumer either answering our call or forcing them to call us.

Nowhere on the list above do you see consumers asking for a better way to be called. If you call a consumer and they do not want to talk to you, they not only have the option of sending you directly to voicemail, they can block your phone number forever and report it to their phone carrier as a robocall. This is assuming that your incoming call is not labeled or blocked as spam. How is that for consumer control, as in the consumer has the control, not the other way around. Yet the industry still believes that this is the best way to collect. We have to change, and we have to change today.

For years we have been afraid to take risks. We have become so fearful of losing what we have that we continue to hold on to the ever-shrinking piece of the pie. COIVD-19 is going to put some agencies out of business, which should be a wakeup call that it is time to do something different, rather than continue to do what we have always done. What we need to do today is fundamentally shift our business to be more consumer-focused. We can do this if we choose. Look what we did to get our employees the ability to work from home. Talk about risk-taking! It was also innovating and problem-solving like we have not seen for a very long time. We need to take this experience and now focus it on being consumer-driven with real innovation. This will not be easy.

We will get sued. We will have regulatory scrutiny. This is nothing new, and we are already well equipped to deal with it. We may, however, get sued less because a consumer does not go searching for a way to stop the calls and ultimately finds a plaintiff lawyer instead. We may also have fewer consumer complaints because they were able to solve their financial problem on their own. If we treat consumers the way they want to be treated and engage with them the way they want to be engaged with, then they will have less of a reason to want to sue us or file a complaint.

Today, more than ever, we have a chance to change and become consumer-focused before we cannot reverse the decline, and nothing can save us. The good news is we are not alone, and we do not have to do this by ourselves. We have thought leaders like those found at insideARM and its very fortunate members, like Joann Needleman, who is freely providing her time and thoughts on next steps with content like “Your Website, Your New Normal.” There are countless others out there that can help us, but we also need to be listening to our consumers and be willing to take risks for them.

The wave of accounts that are coming cannot be serviced by debt collectors alone, and consumers today will not pay you if you don’t engage with them the way they want to be engaged with. The organizations that will not only survive but thrive will be the ones that take risks to give consumers what they want. Those will be the organizations with a long-term future.

—-

^[1] The Convenience Revolution: How to Deliver a Customer Service Experience that Disrupts the Competition and Creates Fierce Loyalty by Shep Hyken

https://a.co/31gJlsh

^[2] https://gerrymcgovern.com/books/top-tasks-a-how-to-guide/read-the-first-chapter/

—-

The iA Innovation Council is a collaborative working group of product, tech, strategy, and operations thought leaders at the forefront of analytics, communications, payments, and compliance technology. Group members meet in person (and lately, virtually) several times each year to engage in substantive dialogue and whiteboard sessions with the creative thinkers behind the latest innovations for the industry, the regulators who audit and establish guardrails for new technology, and educators, entrepreneurs and innovators from outside the industry who inspire different thinking. 

2020 members include:

Editor’s note: This article is provided through a partnership between insideARM and Squire Patton Boggs LLP, which provides a steady stream of timely, insightful and entertaining takes on TCPAWorld.com of the ever-evolving, never-a-dull-moment Telephone Consumer Protection Act. Squire Patton Boggs LLP—and all insideARM articles—are protected by copyright. All rights are reserved.

—

In Stewart v. Credit Control, LLC, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 81332, the Northern District of Illinois dismissed a pro se claim against a debt collector. The plaintiff claimed that the debt collector, who pulled the plaintiff’s credit information to facilitate collection of a debt, lacked a “permissible purpose” for obtaining his information.

[article_ad]

In addressing the defendant’s motion to dismiss, the court noted an inescapable truth of the Fair Credit Reporting Act: it is a complete defense to an FCRA claim if a party has a permissible purpose for obtaining a consumer’s credit report. Plaintiff readily admitted that the defendant was a debt collector, but argued that the only permissible purpose for obtaining his information was to offer him credit. However, the court held, in accordance with multiple other courts, that debt collection is a permissible purpose for obtaining a consumer’s information under the FCRA, and rejected this argument.

Plaintiff also argued that the debt collector’s use of a “soft pull” to obtain his information, which would not show up on his credit report should another third party seek his information, was not included in the definition of “permissible purpose” under the FCRA. The court again disposed of this argument, as “permissible purpose” means exactly that—a purpose that’s permissible, regardless of the method.

Plaintiff’s claims against various furnishers and a credit reporting agency are still pending, and we’ll keep an eye on this as it develops.

—

Want to track current FCRA court decisions and trends? The iA Case Law Tracker does that in less time than it takes to pour your morning cup of coffee.

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) announced that it will once again extend the comment period to the Supplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (SNPRM) for time-barred debts. The new deadline for comments is now August 4, 2020. 

Originally, SNPRM comments were due on May 4, 2020. The CFPB issued a notice extending the deadline to June 5 due to concerns that the COVID-19 pandemic would prevent stakeholders from providing meaningful comments. Similar reasoning was used for the most recent extension.

The SNPRM—which was predicted due to the CFPB’s placeholder in the time-barred debt section of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and the disclosure survey conducted by the CFPB in 2019—lays out requirements for debt collectors who are collecting on accounts that are barred by the applicable statute of limitations. In other words, these proposed rules would control accounts for which the creditor’s time period to sue the consumer to collect the debt has passed.

The requirements include prohibitions on filing suit on time-barred debt accounts and certain disclosures that a debt collector must make depending on the laws of the applicable jurisdiction.

COLLINGSWOOD, N.J. — Are you a debt collection company or call center with underutilized staff due to restrictions related to the Coronavirus pandemic?  The skills your employees already have match the current, immediate need governments at all levels now have for contact tracers. As the nation moves towards re-opening and recovering from the pandemic, contact tracing efforts will be key in responding to new outbreaks and aiding in mitigation efforts.  If you see the value in shifting your company focus to include call center and contact tracing, sign up to get free call center and contract tracing leads today at MyGovWatch.com.

These RFPs are in response to government agencies and health departments across the nation urgently trying to hire contact tracers. As a debt collector or call center, your employees already know how to handle the key components of contact tracing; problem solving, respecting the privacy of the individual and responding with patience and compassion in a time of crisis. 

Companies like yours can use MyGovWatch.com to hear about new call center and contract tracing leads (plus debt collection leads, too) once per week for free via our Weekly Lead Digest.  For a small monthly spend, you can hear about these leads daily instead of weekly and receive other benefits. Companies of significant size have access to premium tools to include:

• Open procurement tracking services to ensure users hear about every addendum and procurement change in real time.

• The ability to submit questions to buyers anonymously through the site.

• Contract award announcements as they become known.

• Access to hard-to-obtain government documents like contracts, evaluations, and winning proposals to enable users to see detailed information showing why specific companies won specific procurements and – as important – why others did not.

• Search tools to let users research competitor pricing and winning proposals by buyer type, region, and other attributes.

• Advanced notice of upcoming procurements to kick start the sales cycle.

About MyGovWatch.com

MyGovWatch.com, the government contract intelligence website offering users more than just leads for public sector procurements since 2008, lets users access unlimited “Premium” data in industries to include Debt Collection, Call Center, and EMS Billing. Since its 2018 relaunch, the site now enables anyone to specify their particular interests from among ten top-level industries, from professional services to construction to finance and technology and beyond.  Users can set preferences to be notified about leads in nearly sixty sub-industries, such as collections, billing, systems development, business services, and others, covering every conceivable type of government purchase. Learn more at www.mygovwatch.com.

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Capital Collection Management (CCM), a provider of first-party and third-party collections, debt purchasing, and litigation services, hired Corinne Galavitz as its Controller. In this role, she is responsible for managing cash flow, ensuring proper accounting for all collections, maintaining the accounting software, and working with leadership to ensure the company’s financial health.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Corinne as she brings over a decade of experience in financials and accounting to CCM,” said Jacob Corlyon, Co-Founder and CEO of CCM. “Her expertise will be essential as the company continues to grow in the rapidly evolving collections industry.”

Before joining CCM, Corinne was the Affiliate Accounting Manager at Bankers Healthcare Group, where she was responsible for maintaining the financial records for BHG and its sister companies. She became a Certified Public Accountant in 2010 and her experience also includes 10 years in public accounting at two different regional CPA firms, where many of her clients were small businesses. 

Corinne earned a bachelor’s degree in Public Accounting from the State University of New York at Oswego and is a member of the AICPA and NYSSCPA.

About Capital Collection Management

Capital Collection Management (CCM) provides modern, technology-driven collections, debt purchasing, and litigation services for enterprises that need engagement with empathy, experience with compliance, and excellence in debt recovery. Leveraging state-of-the-art analytics and machine learning combined with a service-focused approach, CCM helps organizations from a variety of industries protect their brands and improve their bottom lines. To learn more, visit www.capitalcollect.com and follow us on LinkedIn.