96 Plans for Collecting by Mail
A plan-book from the A. W. Shaw Company, publisher of System, the Magazine of Business, given to subscribers as a supplement.
What it is
A plan-book from the A. W. Shaw Company, publisher of System, the Magazine of Business, given to subscribers as a supplement. It prints 96 collection plans picked from several hundred sent in by credit men, most headed with a result: Plan 1's first letter brought 78 checks from 100 mailed, and Plan 94's card listing a debtor's broken promises settled eight of ten accounts in five days. The plans run from polite reminders to sight drafts and threat-of-suit letters, a ballot the debtor marks instead of writing (Plan 9), twelve pointed questions (Plan 83), coin cards for small accounts, a torn desk-calendar leaf (Plan 96), and a pay-up week in Wilson, North Carolina, that collected $73,000 (Plan 92). Plan 28 sets a harsh agency letter beside an impartial one that replaced it. Plan 43 reduces the credit policies of 286 merchants to six rules. An index sorts plans by problem.
Why read it now
Getting paid is still a marketing problem, and this book treats each dunning letter as copy measured by replies. Several rules hold. State the exact amount and due date. Assume payment instead of begging. Make paying easier than writing an excuse, which is what the ballot does and what a payment link with preset reply buttons does now. Tone decides results: Plan 28 found the harsh letter put debtors on the defensive. Modern trials agree; the UK Behavioural Insights Team raised tax payment rates by telling late payers that most people pay on time, the same social pressure behind the pay-up week. What has dated: the result figures are contributors' own counts with no control group, and the shaming tactics, the unfair list, the dead beat label and the stream of threats, would breach debt-collection rules in many markets today. Use: build a three-step reminder for overdue invoices, a neutral statement, a reply card with options such as paid, dispute or pay by a date, and a firm final notice, then compare wording by the share paid within seven days.
Passages worth keeping
The entire letter is dominated by the 'will you' element; the 'we' element is left out.
رسالة التحصيل الناجحة تتحدث عن المطلوب من القارئ لا عن حاجة الشركة، فتضع الفعل على عاتق المدين بهدوء ودون استجداء.
It even relieves the customer of the trouble of writing a letter.
حين يكفي المدين أن يضع علامة على خيار جاهز، يختفي عذر الانشغال ويصبح الالتزام بموعد محدد أسهل من التهرب.
An investigation to find the reason showed that in a great many instances the letter antagonized the debtor and put him on the defensive, instead of inducing him to make a special effort to settle the account.
التهديد والتخويف يدفعان المدين إلى الدفاع عن نفسه بدل السداد، ولذلك استبدلت الوكالة رسالتها القاسية بأخرى محايدة.
They held a "pay-up week," and collected $73,000.
تجار مدينة كاملة حوّلوا السداد إلى حملة عامة بإعلانات وشعار موحد، فصار دفع الدين سلوكًا جماعيًا لا مطالبة فردية محرجة.
Out of ten cards I recently sent, eight brought settlement within five days after their receipt.
بطاقة تعرض على المدين وعوده السابقة بتواريخها كانت كافية لتسوية أغلب الحسابات، لأن مواجهته بكلامه أقوى من أي تهديد.
The scanned text has OCR errors. The passages are quoted from it, with only obvious slips fixed.
What it teaches best
Read the original archive.org
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