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Locate, Litigate and Levy: The shortest road to recovery.Whether through indifference, deliberate disregard or simply by relocating, debtors are becoming increasingly more sophisticated at the "art of evasion". This combined with the fact that consumer debt is at an all-time high (and continues to increase) makes it challenging to deliver effective demands to your debtors that will stand-out among the many others they likely receive. When everything else fails, send your debtors the one message that can not be ignored: file suit. By definition, "leverage" is power and control. You can exercise this power if and only if you locate attachable assets for your debtors. Most companies in the debt-recovery industry fail to use the legal system to their advantage. Some of the reasons: "It's too expensive"; "I do not have the resources to locate assets"; "Suing is a complicated process"; "I can't hire an attorney". On the surface, these appear to be valid reasons. Meanwhile your debtors are paying those creditors that have taken that step, ignoring your letters and messages. And they will not pay you until your message is elevated to that degree of priority. Step One: Locating Assets.Nowadays you do not need to maintain in-house staff to locate assets. You can outsource this tedious task to companies that specialize in asset searching. Most only charge on the "pay per hit" basis. You can also perform quick and inexpensive searches yourself by using the various on-line services available today. The two assets that will lead you a prompt recovery are a debtor's place of employment or his bank account. Once you have obtained a judgment, a debtor's job or a bank account are readily available to be levied upon. Another attachable asset that yields its benefits longer term but is very effective is a home or property. Having an Abstract of Judgment against someone's property means that your debt will have to be paid-off before the property is sold, transferred or refinanced. Once you have identified an asset, you are ready for step two. Step Two: Litigating.If your debtors reside in a state where wage garnishments are allowed, you are half way there. Then you need to set up your litigation structure. You will need an attorney, preferably on a monthly retainer. That is, your attorney will get paid the same amount regardless of the cases you file. An additional fee can be worked out in case extraordinary litigation is needed or in any adversary proceeding. For instance, one of your debtors answers your complaint or they file a Claim of Exemption when you attempt to levy on their wages. Those instances are rare. You will also need a system to manage your cases and print your legal documents. A software system that I recommend is CollectOne-Tiger from Collection Data Systems. This collection-agency management software system is a comprehensive tool that will maintain and track all your cases as well as generate all of your legal documents. Click here are a list of features of the CollectOne-Tiger's Legal Module or fill out this form to request a demonstration of this system. Step Three: Collecting your
judgment; wage levies.
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