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Hi there, Michael Bovee with Consumer Recovery Network.
And today I want to talk about settling or
negotiating settlements, or payments even,
with United Collections Bureau, UCB.
They're a pretty big debt collection agency,
they're the typical contingency type of debt collector.
In other words, when you hear from them,
it's over the phone, or notices in the mail.
And they're trying to collect for their boss,
whoever it was that hired them, right?
So if Citibank sent a debt to UCB, they still own it.
UCB is just trying to get you to pay and
they get paid if they get you to pay.
In other words, let's say you owe $10,000 and
they were able to collect 5,000 of that from you.
They get paid maybe 15% of what they got you to pay,
in this case 5,750 bucks, right?
So, that's how a contingency collector will work.
You can use that to your advantage cuz
the fact of the matter is, contingency debt collectors
are there if you're able to resolve a debt, and
if you're on my channel watching any videos, it's usually because
you're looking for ways to resolve debt.
They're there as a tool to help you do it, and
they're motivations are your motivation.
They're there to make money,
you're working with them to save money.
Okay, so both of you want to get the account resolved.
You just have to work within the confines of what they're capable
of doing, because of who your creditor is and
or what your situation looks like.
What do I mean by, what your situation looks like?
Debt collectors care about, visibly,
how collectible you appear to them.
One of the ways, and the primary way that they are able to
develop an attitude about what they should be able to get you
to pay is they have real-time access to your credit report.
So UCV in this case is they got a debt collector who has either
an algorithm that's showing them how collectible you look or
is actually looking at your credit report.
And can see if you're making a mortgage payment,
a car payment on time, never have fallen behind.
Maybe you're paying other credit cards on time,
just not this one.
Or maybe not this one and another one, but
you're paying other creditors, nonetheless.
So, that makes it look like you have some type of income, and
it's steady enough to maintain mortgage, car,
credit card payments.
As opposed to somebody who might have a mortgage and a car, but
nine credit cards or other types of unsecured credit debt aren't
being paid, they're in collections.
So you look like somebody who is less able to afford their life,
or their business.
Okay, if you're in a situation where you can fund a lump sum
settlement, in other words say $10,000 again.
And we'll pick on Citibank cuz we already have.
And Citibank's floor of what they're, and this is just for
example purposes, but let's say they're allowing UCB
to settle as low as 35% so 3,500 in this situation.
If you can come up with that money in a lump sum,
it is worth while to reach out to UCB and
negotiate that settlement in one lump sum.
Obviously, you wanna get everything documented.
I have other videos on the channel about getting your
settlements documented before you make payments.
UCB is very familiar with sending out documentation.
Don't take no for an answer, in other words.
You wanna set up payment deadlines that are consistent
with you being able to receive that in the mail, so
sometimes a couple of weeks out.
One of the things about dealing with contingency debt
collectors, in this case, United Collections Bureau,
is that they have a limited amount of time that they
are gonna be trying to collect from you.
Typically, that limitation is several months, okay?
Citibank, again, let's say they send out a batch of accounts to
UCB, yours is one of them.
And you start to hear from UCB.
The moment you start to hear from them with the first phone
call or letter,
count forward what I usually encourage about 90 days.
And if you're unable to get the outcome that you need or
get the lowest settlement that you can afford to pay,
and you still have a realistic target somewhere between 35, 40,
you know 50%.
If you're not able to get it in that first week in that first
phone call, sometimes it makes a difference if you call
the following month, and sometimes it makes a difference
if you call closer to the end of the month, why?
Because they have certain goals that they're
trying to hit, right?
So, and it's not just, UCB as a collection agency as
a whole, the debt collector that's working on your file
might have some goals that they wanna hit on a monthly basis.
Or the team that it works with inside of the debt collection
agency has to achieve certain goals.
Those goals mean they can get a bonus.
That means maybe they even get to keep their job,
cuz they might not be that great of a collector.
So it's important to use these kind of strategies,
call back several times closer to the end of the month,
still leaving yourself time to get the documentation faxed,
or often still for whatever reason,
collectors are reluctant to email.
So you have to assume that mail's gonna take a week, right?
So maybe you start negotiating on the 20th of the month,
to time the ability to fund it, call in the payment,
or often times pay these things on their website,
at the end of the month and meet that deadline.
So use those things to your advantage and
know that if you're getting closer to where it's 90 days
that UCB has had the account, now they're going to lose it and
they aren't gonna make a penny off you.
So that's going to be, if they are motivated by reaching
certain goals or retaining the account in some way or
another, getting them all the way closer to the end of
the cycle where they're gonna have to lose the account,
send it back to Citibank in this example.
Sometimes is where that's the deal kicks loose,
that you can afford, or that's realistic.
Okay, that's about settling, what about payments?
UCB, just like any collector, wants your money.
So it's gonna be simple to get them agree to take payments.
But you're not always gonna be able to
get them to agree to what you can afford to pay,
because their boss, the creditor that sent them the account,
may not typically agree to those low of payments, okay?
So if all you can afford to do is send $25 a month and
it's a $10,000 account, why would you?
First off, because that's just nonsensical.
You're not making a dent in the actual principal, and
don't be surprised if UCB won't take that payment.
You have to be somebody that typically is going to be able to
repay these debts with a debt collector.
With payments, they're looking at 12 or
24 month targets usually on the outside.
Not much further than that.
So, if it's a payment situation,
you just can't simply impossible for you to raise the money and
do it in a lump sum, which I encourage a great deal,
obviously, to get this behind you.
But if it's a payment situation, there's some flexibility there.
Just realize, you still wanna get it done relatively quickly.
Thanks for tuning in.
I'll see you on the next video.
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