Our client was (still is) a steel fabricator, providing custom steel work for their clients. It’s specialist work and, once a project is made, it pretty much can’t be used anywhere else, even reclaiming the work done is of little value to the fabricator.

Fortunately, they recognised the risks of providing credit and approached us to help them reduce that risk. We assessed their business and helped them put protocols and systems in place that gave them the highest level of protection possible. This included customised, lawyer reviewed Terms and Conditions that every customer has to agree to before being allowed credit with the company.

Not long after putting this in place, the fabricator had a customer debt of almost $3,700 become overdue beyond their terms. They referred the debt to us and, because they had followed the processes we had put in place with them, we were able to collect the full amount within one week.

The debtor was unable to use the usual ‘excuses’ and ‘tactics’ that we see debtors try and use every day, simply because the Terms and Conditions and the processes our client had used rendered such excuses and tactics as useless.

Though our client could easily have said, ‘We’ll be okay, we don’t need Terms and Conditions or processes in place,’ the investment that they made in putting them in place was more than paid back the very first time they had to apply it.

The same system that we put in place for this client is now the backbone of our brand new specialist Credit Risk Control Division. The system has different levels of application that vary depending on the needs and size of the business.

You can contact our Credit Risk Control specialists via email or phone (1300 308 669) for more information or, alternatively, you can assess your own credit risk with our new two minute Credit Risk Assessment Tool. The tool is free to use and gives you a clear indication of the current level of credit risk your business is exposed to and measures you can take to reduce that risk for minimal cost.