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Our Subscribers Say...
I think Credit Today is fantastic. You cover many practical topics in the credit field that I use regularly. Just one recent example—a conversation on the ListServ about preferential payments—gave me tips that I used in an actual case. The specific information I picked up from this one discussion saved me $10,000, enough to cover my membership for many years!
- Steve Savino
Manager of Credit & Collections, ASSA Abloy Americas Division, New Haven, CT
Credit Today's Resource Directory and their online e-mail forum (ListServ) provide information on almost any credit-related topic you can think of. It is a great way to exchange information with other credit professionals. As the saying goes, "You don't know what you don't know."
- Scott Goen,
Credit Manager, Big Lots Stores, Inc., Wholesale Division
"We've recently started using the ListServ tool within Credit Today. This is phenomenal and powerful forum for gaining immediate feedback, ideas, and suggestions, relative to any credit topic under the sun, all in a real-time e-mail format."
-Javier Vela, Senior Credit Manager, Global Credit Services, JDA Software Group Inc.
"Being a part of the Credit Today online community is like having the expertise of hundreds of credit managers at your fingertips. These credit execs are willing to help you solve topical business issues as they arise. In the current environment of ever increasing competing priorities which reduce our opportunities to meet peers out of the office face-to-face, this is the most valuable tool you can have on your desktop! It's important that we have a mechanism to reach out to our counterparts quickly to exchange knowledge as well as to stay on top of industry trends."
- Victoria Artis, Director of Customer Financial Services, Pfizer, Inc.
"Over the last 10 years I've seen Credit Today evolve from a monthly credit publication into a quality source of information and guidance for the B2B credit community. The website, with its user friendly form downloads, will take you from examples of new account credit applications to bankruptcy forms and everything in between.
The Credit Today ListServ has become the pre-eminent online forum, providing an opportunity for discussion and comments (and occasional humor) from an impressive list of credit professionals."
David Dungan, Director of Credit
Justin Brands, Inc. (A Berkshire Hathaway company)
Fort Worth, Texas
"There are numerous credit periodicals available to the credit professional today. How good is Credit Today? Is it relevant? I always have to read it late, or online because my credit analysts want to read it the minute it comes in. When my staff wants to read a publication before I have a chance to read it then something is working in that publication. We have cancelled our other subscriptions. When you have the best you do not need the rest."
Ron Woods
Corporate Credit Manager-World Wide
Thales Navigation, Inc.
"The newsletter, coupled with the website and the ListServ, are to us, more valuable than any other credit publication, bar none. I try to use at least one article out of each newsletter for departmental training/discussion sessions."
D. Mark Constantine
Corporate Credit Mgr
Fulton Paper Company
"I love Credit Today and read every issue cover to cover. For me, the greatest perk of a subscription is ListServ. I believe Credit Today's ListServ members may be the most knowledgeable Credit brain trust in existence today. I have saved and categorized hundreds of contributions on a wide variety of topics which I refer to often. It's an easy and cost effective way to network and learn."
Doug M. Thomas
Kimberly-Clark Customer Financial Services |
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The Best Credit Departments in the World!
Yes, that's what you'll read about here, in Credit Today's exclusive Credit Department Profiles section. You'll learn what's working at credit departments ranging anywhere from Fortune 50 operations to those with just one (overworked) person.
Just a few of the world's leading credit departments featured include Campbell Soup Company, Georgia Pacific, Serta Matress, BJ Services Company, USA, Hachette Filipacci Magazines, VF Jeanswear, USXpress, and Canon USA.
As you can see, we cover all industries, from manufacturing to media to service and everything in between. There's something valuable to learn from all of them! And don't worry - "world class" doesn't always mean big and deep pockets. You see, we also aim to find and highlight what every day credit operations are doing to get by - and excel, on less than adequate resources and unappreciative management. No one - even the best - has unlimited resources these days, so "world class" can often mean a small, underfunded operation that has found a way to do things very well despite their limited resources.
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Energizing a Credit Staff's Potential
A credit staff can work for a long time without ever achieving its full potential. Lack of training, direction and/or up-to-date systems and procedures can lock it into consistently sub par performance. Then again, with the training and systems readily available today, the same staff can quickly blossom into super performance. That's what happened here under a new manager committed to excellence. . . .
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Saving Struggling Customers
We all rejoice in win-win solutions. What about lose-lose? That's when a lender drastically cuts or eliminates a company's credit line, and suppliers feel compelled to follow suit by cutting their exposures. It's happening all too often now, and both lenders and suppliers will pay the price with potentially profitable business lost forever. Here's one veteran credit manager's strategy for keeping that business. . . .
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Meeting Today's Credit Management Challenges With Shared Services
The Recession may be ending. Recovery may be underway. But forget about returning to "normal". We are entering a business environment of ever more rigorous cost controls, electronic everything and staff performance requirements that many veteran employees may never be able to achieve. You might call it the age of the shared services model. This article explores how Elizabeth Arden combined and consolidated their global credit, collection, and accounts receivable operations into two shared services operations in the U.S. and Geneva. Learn their challenges and successes. . . .
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Credit Department Profile: A 'Hands Around Everything' Management Strategy
When a check arrived for $300 less than the amount due, Credit and Collection Manager James Elliott picked up the phone to call his service manager. "That must have been for the gloves we had a problem with," the service manager told him. "But we replaced them. She shouldn't have taken a deduction." Then Elliott was right on the phone to the customer. "She was surprised to hear from me," he told us. "I think she was counting on the check going into a lockbox and the bank just depositing it." So the customer didn't fight it. She sent the balance due right away. The incident illustrates Elliott's "hands around everything" strategy for managing the department. . . .
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Optimizing Off-Shore Credit Staffing
Five years ago when Brenda Jalowiec became credit manager of Emerson Electric's Motor Division, now a subsidiary of Nidec Motor Corporation, she found a significant part of her department's staff 12 time zones away in Manila. She now has seven subordinates there handling collections, cash applications and customer maintenance. What are the challenges of managing such a far-flung operation? Read on and learn... - How to deal with pushback from customers concerned about non-US staffers
- Quality control measures they use to monitor collection staff
- Why the Filipino culture works so well in handling tough customer-service and credit-related tasks
- A simple strategy for handling an angry and abusive customer
- The training used for overseas collectors
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Marketing Staff Collecting? Changing The Culture At This Credit Department
Winning 100 percent of a customer's business has long been top priority at Albany International Corporation, as indeed it is to most suppliers of the paper manufacturing industry. What's curious to a credit professional's skeptical eye is that the marketing staff charged with achieving this dominance is also responsible for making collections. Learn... - how Albany International structures their credit department
- What specific steps Golden took to "elevate" the importance of credit with sales and marketing and literally change the culture at the company towards receivables
- The reaction he received when he suddenly began appearing at sales meetings
- Steps he took to upgrade the quality of credit information they received
- A unique report he sends to top management on credit exposures over a minimum threshold - what's in it, why, and how it's formated
- Traps to avoid when shaking up a culture
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The Right Combination
"We have automatic dunning cycles. We call customers, and we write to them. We try to stay on top of slow payers as much as possible. The biggest credit challenge," continues Steven A. Fistel, directo . . .
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Sticking to a Policy That Works
This article details the credit policy established by AFG Industries, a Kingsport, TN, manufacturer of flat glass for architectural residential markets. In this article, you'll learn: - In addition to the usual info, what three key clauses are included on their credit app
- The key red flag (and why) they look for when checking the list of trade credit references
- What information is reviewed
- Strategies for establishing and setting up marginal customers
- Four ways they monitor existing customers
- How their documentation system works and what it tracks
- What trends they look for when monitoring customers for problems
- The importance of working with sales
- Customer visits: Three red flags that the Director of Credit looks for when visiting customers that might be in trouble
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Keeping Customer Relations Respectful and Flexible
Until two years ago, Regional Credit Manager Dale Sawchik e-mailed or faxed delinquent customers demand letters and gave them 10 days to respond. The 10-day demand notice is an industry-wide tactic. Then he started giving these customers 24 hours. He's found that he gets a high percentage of people calling him back, and he believes it's because they perceive this demand as more of a high priority item. . . .
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Yes, Virginia, You Can Integrate Credit and Sales-Sometimes
Two-thirds of EMI CMG Distribution's customer base accounts for only 4 percent of the company's sales volume. But until two years ago, a $300 delinquency with one of these small customers--typically a mom-and-pop music and book stores--would take up the time of a credit specialist. This was hardly the most effective use of the credit department's professional staff, and the problem was aggravated because the company was in a downsizing mode due to contraction throughout the music industry. So John Vogelaar, then credit services director and now customer services and sales support director, was asked by senior management to come up with a reorganization plan. . . .
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The Power of One: How a one-man credit department produces extraordinary results
There's a world map on the wall of Tom Cochrane's office. "That's my territory," he tells new sales reps at their meeting with him, part of their routine initial training. "What's yours?" He's making an important point. There are more than 70 sales reps in his gear manufacturing company, but there's only one credit manager. In fact, Cochrane is the entire department, an arrangement he's found to be an advantage. "I've got my thumb on the company's pulse," he notes. "If there were more people in this department, there might be other thumbs on it." That, he believes, would just create confusion. And there's no question that he's getting the work done. Last year, despite the difficult economy, Philadelphia Gear's profit goals were met and bad debt write-offs were less than .01 percent. . . .
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The Best of Both Worlds: Entrepreneurial Culture and Help From Corporate Office Add up to Strong Receivables
Sometimes we do our work too well. When top management reviewed the article below, they were concerned it would reveal too much about their credit department operations to their competitors. They didn't object, however, to our publishing the article anonymously, and that's what we've done. This company's sales have grown from $1 billion to over $8 billion in the last 20 years. Some of this growth can be attributed to acquisitions and to expansion of their market. But it's also the result of an entrepreneurial culture in which local managements at each of the company's more than 40 distribution centers handle their own operations, sales and, of course, credit and collections. The credit managers at these centers are hired by the local managers and may or may not have extensive experience and expertise. . . .
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Managing Credit With Minimal Financial Information
Urgent as it has become to accurately assess customers' financial strength, Credit Manager Jim Cunningham, a 32-year veteran of trade credit, finds that getting the information for making astute decisions has never been more difficult. It's "almost unheard of" that you can get a large bank to give you customer information today, he notes. Smaller banks may still be taking calls and talking, but that, he adds, is more of an old boy network. Bigger banks distribute information amongst themselves but don't distribute it to unsecured creditors, he tells us. And hedge funds and private equity lenders are even worse. It sounds good, he says, when a customer calls and says that they've got some kind of hedge fund backing them. When he hears that, he asks for personal guarantees, but "that's when we see them running," he relates. S elling from some 80 locations, O'Neal is the country's largest family-owned steel service center. Cunningham's region stretches from Atlanta on the East Coast to four districts in Colorado and includes the O'Neal facility in Monterrey, Mexico. . . .
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Bankruptcy Issues
