Any tool that can optimise your collections strategy and improve efficiencies in your operation, is sure to make an impact on your collected yields. In our years helping collections operations to optimise and improve their collection strategies, we’ve found that data-driven debt collection tools offer the optimal solution to optimise and improve your recovery yields and increase your business revenue.

With that in mind, and with the sheer volume of data at your disposal in 2018, here are the debt collection tools that will have the biggest impact and that you should look to implement this year:

Call centre virtual assistants

Machine learning and advanced data analytic techniques are often used in combination with behavioural sciences to develop coaching bots. Virtual assistants for call centre agents guide and support agents through calls in real-time, offers them easy access to information and motivates and inspires high performance. Bots can deliver real-time performance metrics and recommended actions or treatment during calls to help agents realise the best possible outcome for every call.

Agents can build on existing relationships by viewing customer or account data visually during a call, such as how long they have been a customer/account, last call outcome and analytical insights e.g. customer behaviour; individual preferred instalment; rehabilitation eligibility; discount offers etc. Improved efficiency and customer experience will result in increased staff satisfaction and financial outcome.

Yield forecasting tools

How do you currently manage month-end expectations? Do you compare last month, same time or last year, same time or a combination of the two? Do you take seasonal anomalies into consideration?

While using data is a good start, basic analysis is often unreliable and insufficient. It creates inter-month inaccuracies resulting in an inaccurate month-end expectation. It does not provide recommended pro-active remedial action to implement and when to implement in order to achieve the desired result.

Standard comparisons will not give you the answers you need to create a strategy that will see results accurately. For collection operations, a critical success factor is the ability to predict month-end outcomes accurately and at an early stage of the billing cycle.

Using predictive analytics and machine learning methods, it is possible to forecast yields accurately, and predict which remedial actions will have a short or long term impact if you are not tracking to your targets. Use these insights to inform your business and collections strategy.

Chatbots

The fact that the call centre environment is drastically changing and incorporating technology will lead to the end of the days of call centre agents performing mundane tasks like providing balances, statements, giving banking details: to be delivered by self-service AI bots. AI bots use a combination of data analytics, machine learning and deep learning algorithms to not only perform tasks but also to learn from every interaction to improve subsequent communications and new generation customer experience.

With the inclusion of AI solutions into operations, call centre agents focus will be as intended, to perform specialist duties like resolving default account queries, negotiating for optimal repayment arrangements, and educating debtors to become credit-wise. Your collections strategy going forward should be looking to include both call centre agents and AI technology in symbiosis, as this will ensure your collection yields are higher than ever.

Implementing these three solutions into your collection strategy in 2018, will have you seeing improved returns and increased yields. If you want to find other ways to optimise your collection and recovery yields with data analytics, download our expert guide.