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NEW YORK — LexisNexis Risk Solutions recently rolled out a new tool intended to boost skip-tracing productivity for collectors and recovery agencies.

The company contends LexisNexis Accurint for Collections Skip Wizard can simplify skip-tracing and turn novice collectors and recovery agents into skilled skip-tracers without expensive training.

Executives explained Skip Wizard can improve efficiency and productivity by providing a customizable, step-by-step process. They indicated this process uses intelligent search functionality, data analysis and an evaluation of relationship data to guide collectors and agents through the skip-tracing process, helping them determine the best possible course of action.

LexisNexis believes that 40 to 60 percent of accounts in a collection portfolio typically do not have a valid phone number for a point-of-contact when received from a client. As a result, the company reiterated a point that collectors and recovery agents readily know — they must rely on skip-tracing to locate and contact debtors.

"Skip-tracing, however, can be difficult to learn and challenging to master. Acquiring proficiency requires experience and training," LexisNexis pointed out.

Because of frequent turnover in the industry and the scarcity of experienced skip-locators, LexisNexis noted that many collection organizations must rely on less-skilled collectors to trace and locate debtors, resulting in fewer skip locates and high associated expenses.

To overcome that situation, the company stressed that Skip Wizard is designed to help by enabling collection organizations and recovery agencies to overcome online trace and locate challenges by providing collectors with a simple and easy to follow workflow.

As a result, company executives believe Skip Wizard can reduces the amount of training required to achieve skip-tracing efficiency. They also assert the solution can decrease unproductive calling, allowing an organization to better allocate their skip-tracing resources.

LexisNexis went on to highlight how Skip Wizard is meant to operate.

The tool first attempts to provide collectors and recovery agents with direct contact information for a debtor. If a collector is then unsuccessful in locating a debtor, subsequent contact information is provided for leads that may be able to assist in providing relevant information.

Also, duplicate information can be filtered out so that only unique results are presented to the collector during a Skip Wizard session.

"Collection organizations tend to struggle at effectively managing the performance of skip portfolios because skip-tracing is such a difficult skill to master," explained Robert Fite, vice president of LexisNexis Receivables Management Solutions.

"Skip Wizard walks collectors through a workflow, drawing upon best practices for locating hard-to-find debtors, thereby reducing the expense associated with training collection staff, and improving performance," he added.

Fite went on to emphasize that incorporating best practice collections techniques through Skip Wizard can ensure agencies are following a standardized approach on each account. In addition, he noted the solution can be customized to allow organizations to limit the scope of work performed on an account based on balance.

LexisNexis shared the experiences of an organization that used Skip Wizard through a trial run.

"The feedback from our collectors has been outstanding," noted Paul Allen, general manager of First Financial Asset Management, a U.S.-based accounts receivable management firm that beta tested the solution this spring.

"Skip Wizard is an incredibly efficient tool that eliminates many tedious steps in the skip-tracing process," Allen continued. "Skip Wizard enables our less experienced collectors to quickly and accurately locate the information they need. Our collectors saw immediate results; in fact, collectors who didn't have it were envious of those who did."