Has this every happened to you? You have an account that owes your
company a considerable amount of money. Everything goes well for awhile.
The payments are made on time, the debtor calls you just because he
wants to know how he can make your day better (hey, this is my dream!).
Then
one day no more calls and worse yet, no more payments. You, being the
good employee that you are, attempt to call them and you discover that
they have disappeared off of the face of the planet. So, you go back
through your previous issues of Collection Advisory to look in the Skip
Trace column to ensure your best possibility of finding your debtor. You
begin your search process and you can not find any thing, WHAT NOW?
The
question is, are you looking for the right information? Confirming the
information that you begin with is essential. Are you certain that the
name, address social security number and phone number were TOTALLY
correct from the start? I know the debtor gave you every bit of
information that you asked for, but if you did not get the complete
information you may have to spend considerable time, money and effort to
get it corrected. Let me explain:
Name
Have you spelled the
name correctly? Is it John, Jon, Jonn? Is he Jr., Sr., II or III? Is
Smith her maiden or married name? Too many times we begin a search and
later determine that the person we are looking for is actual the son or
father of the person that we have found.
Address
Is the
address an apartment or mobile home park or a duplex? If so, the address
is not 123 Main St. Instead it may be 123 Main St. Lot 1, or 123 Main
St, Apt 14...you get the picture. Additionally, what if the residence is
on family land, therefore you may have one driveway and multiple
addresses. Go to determine the truest possible address that is listed.
Social Security Number
This
can be a tricky one. Is the social security number that you have for
the debtor the actual number issued by the Social Security
Administration? It is not difficult to have multiple credit bureaus in
one's name. However, due to the identity thieves out there I will not
discuss how that can happen here. Go to determine what state a SSN was issued.
The
first three digits of a social security number dictate in which state
that number was issued. If you have the legal ability to pull the credit
bureau, look in the header section for the age or date of birth. This
is a little trick to see if it is the correct credit bureau. If you do
not see either the age or date of birth, most of the time it is not the
number issued to them by the SSA.
There are several free websites
that you can go to and determine what state and what year a social
security number was issued. If a number was issued ten years before the
debtor was born chances are that is not the correct SSN.
Phone Number
When
the information was originally gathered the debtor told you that this
is their home phone number, is it really? Is it a land line, the wire
that runs from the pole to the jack on the wall? Or, is it a cell phone?
There a few free websites that you can go to and determine if a phone
number is a cell phone or a land line. Go to
input the area code and the prefix, the first three numbers of the
phone number. You will discover if it is a cell or land line, what city
and state it was issued and the telephone company that assigned that
number. Also remember, there are internet companies now that will issue
you a phone number with the area code of your choosing.
Conclusion
Godiva
Chocolate is one of the most expensive chocolates in the world. The
reason, they claim, is that that start with the best ingredients. We
need to be the same. We need to start with totally correct information.
Just like the saying goes, garbage in, garbage out. No deposit no
return. A bird in the hand... OK, OK enough with clichés. Confirm the
information that you start with and you WILL save time, money and
effort.
