Make Your Visit Count
10. Enlist your allies.
Visiting a customer to collect a check may seem like trying to snatch a hostage from enemy territory. It needn't be that way, especially if one of the customer's employees is satisfied with your work. Tracy Wald usually has a good relationship with his clients' project managers. When Wald is looking to collect, he and the project manager will sometimes visit the accounting department together, with Wald playing the role of "bad cop" and the project manager playing the role of "helpless victim." "I'll bring the project manager down to accounting," says Wald. "Then I'll get him to say, 'It's not that I don't trust you. But Tracy says work will have to stop if he doesn't get a purchase order.' "
11. Always bring backup.
When you visit a customer, make sure that you come armed with specific documentation to support what the customer owes you. The last thing you want on a collection visit is a dispute over the amount of the bill. You also don't want to hear customers say that they either lost or never received the invoice that you had sent. Cullen G. Williams, CFO of Larkin Enterprises, heard those and other excuses the first few times that he visited his company's largest customer. But each time he had backup on hand -- time sheets signed by the customer's managers, which showed that Larkin employees had worked a certain number of hours on specific projects.
12. Remain calm.
"You have to be dispassionate about it," Williams advises. "Don't raise your voice, and don't make it personal. Be very bland. Use simple, nonthreatening sentences." Williams speaks from experience. His first visits to one customer came on the heels of some heated interactions between CEO Larkin and some of the customer's employees. Larkin, as co-owner of the company, understandably had both a personal and a professional stake in the large collection and was unable to remain dispassionate about the collecting process. So when Williams took over the task, his job was to diffuse "the harsh past" and make it clear that he'd do "whatever was reasonable to comply with the customer's requests," which meant, in this case, supplying backup documentation "10 times" over, he adds.
Use Phone Etiquette
13. Show some sympathy.
Just as you refrain from getting mad in face-to-face encounters, it doesn't pay to lose your cool on the phone, either. But how can you remain calm when some faceless administrator is giving you the runaround? Nettie Morrison of Foresight -- an administrator herself -- has mastered the art of phone empathy. "I say to them, 'I know they're not paying you to chase around invoices,' or something to that effect," she says. Showing that you understand where people are coming from helps to mollify them and possibly even win them over as an ally.
14. Call before the due date.
Remember when fax machines were first used and it was common to call just to confirm whether someone had received your fax? When it comes to invoices, no matter how they were sent, the same protocol still applies. It's best to make the call before the invoice's due date -- not only to confirm its receipt but also to ensure that the customer's accounts-payable department has all the supporting documentation it needs to cut the check.
15. Get a commitment.
When you've got someone on the phone, always try to get a specific date by which you'll get paid. That is a good rule to follow, both during an initial call for a missed payment and in response to a previously broken customer commitment. Answers like "soon" or "next week" aren't acceptable. If the customer is dodgy about dates, calmly mention what you plan to do if you don't get paid on time. What should you say? You can refer to "the authorities." You can mention the idea of halting work on a project. And you can use statements like "You expect us to ship on time, so we expect you to pay on time," says the Brenner Group's Kadet. "Use that statement often," he adds. However, when you say things like that, be sure to maintain an even tone. And remember, your customer signed a contract. Don't be afraid to refer to it. Constantly. "You must create an expectation within their A/P department that you will call and insist on payment within the contract terms," says Kadet.
16. Keep a journal.
Take detailed notes of every collection conversation you have. Record the date of the conversation; whom you spoke to; the specific commitment the person made to you; and finally, what you ever-so-calmly threatened to do if the commitment was not met. Then, after the actual phone discussion, E-mail your notes of the conversation to your customer contact. That will (a) serve as yet another reminder that you are determined to get paid and (b) create an additional record of the conversation in your (and your customer's) E-mail accounts.
17. Follow up wisely.
If a customer reneges on a commitment to pay, you'll need to consider whether you should follow up on your threat. Keep in mind that your goal is to get paid as soon as possible. Sometimes giving a customer a second chance is the most effective thing to do. Before you follow up on your threat, ask if the customer is in any way dissatisfied with the services you've rendered. "I bring that up, especially when I know they're thrilled," says Tracy Wald. If your customer claims to be happy with your services, then you'll have another reason to act surprised when you ask -- for the second time -- why you haven't yet been paid. Perhaps the administrator that you're dealing with is new to the job; perhaps your contact person just came back from vacation. Regardless, you'll have to make one of two choices: get a second commitment from your customer, or take the action you initially threatened to take.
