How can over-the-phone payments improve debt collection?

Immediate payment over the phone is still a new technology businesses are trying to get their hands on. Especially companies dealing with debt collection operations.

Every day, customers promise debt collectors that they will pay their debts in the next few days. There’s only one problem: these promises are not usually kept. When this happens, debt collectors have no other choice but to repeatedly call back customers and remind them of their outstanding debts. And so the vicious circle of empty promises and no actual payments begins.

Over the past few years though, a unique real-time payment technology, VCC Live Pay, has gained significant ground in the European market. VCC Live Pay is a real game-changer, being the first real-time payment over-the-phone solution in the European region that allows agents at debt collection companies to collect actual payments during a single phone call.

With the increasing customer demand for speed and convenience when interacting with a company, instant and real-time payment solutions are rapidly becoming more and more popular around the world. And as with other industries, debt collection companies also need to respond to these new demands by providing their customers with solutions that let them settle debts via secure and easy payment solutions.

While by now it is almost second nature for customers to initiate real-time payments via web interfaces, the unique technology within VCC Live Pay is the beginning of a new chapter in real-time payment solutions. And what is it that makes VCC Live Pay stand out from the competition? The fact that it allows customers to settle their outstanding debts with an agent during a phone call.

Regarding VCC Live Pay, Péter Málhai, Head of Business Development, VCC Live®, said: “As an operator at one of our clients commented: “with VCC Live Pay, we are now collecting money, not empty promises”. Debt collection companies always struggle with the uncertainty of how many promises will actually turn into real payments. With VCC Live Pay, however, companies can now monitor in real time, hour to hour, how much money they actually collect during their phone calls”.

Using VCC Live Pay is easy:

1. An agent contacts a customer via phone and encourages them to pay their outstanding debt during the phone call.
2. The customer enters their card details via their mobile phone touchpad. Operators have no access to the data.
3. The agent initiates the transaction and helps the customer during the process.

As VCC Live Pay meets the requirements set by PCI DSS, one of the strictest security codes in the world issued by the five largest credit and debit card issuers in the market (Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover and JCB), the payment process is not only easy but also 100% secure.

During the payment process, although an agent is able to see how the request is progressing, at no time do they have access to a customer’s card data. And as the agent remains active throughout the call, they can assist the customer at any time. “Allowing your customers to pay in a cloud environment during a phone conversation with agent assistance is still a very unique feature in the market”, noted Péter Málhai. “In fact, we were the first company in Europe to develop such a technology.”

“In recent years, we helped many of our clients accelerate their debt collection processes with the help of VCC Live Pay,” commented Szabolcs Tóth, Founder and CEO at VCC Live®. “Amongst others, after starting to use VCC Live Pay in 2016, UPC (European cable provider) managed to increase their debt collection rates from 18% to 43% within a year. Today, VCC Live Pay is the most preferred payment option for UPC’s customers to settle their debts, with the company initiating 4000 transactions per 10 operators in a month.”

Learn more about VCC Live Pay or our debt collection software, or call us on: +44 2086380169.