wake up buyer payer people it's a beautiful day go grab yourself another cup of joe and say hello to jim and michelle rhodes on the buy here pay here morning show take it away you two good morning hey happy monday it is monday right yeah it feels like I'm on there with the technical stuff so It kind of does. Issue with the soundboard over here. It's weird that we, you know, yeah, it's ever since we reset the stage or the studio, it's just a little bit. Different. Yeah. And I hear myself now. Like, I don't know what was going on. Well, I adjusted a couple of things. Our regular soundboard is on its way to road podcasters and getting some stuff fixed. So we have something we've been using that has a heck of a lot more knobs and things. And I am, you know, I play a really great tech person on Buy Your Pay Your Nation television. But that's not my strong point. So... Yeah, yeah, it looks like we are, we've, yeah. So quick updates. We're just back in from a weekend with family in Idaho. A wonderful weekend. Although I missed the Northern Lights. I stayed up late. I tried. Two days in a row. Yeah, well. Two days in a row. Because you tried it on Friday night and Saturday night. I mean, I just went through the window that night. But yeah, I tried to, and I missed them. And everybody's showing all the photos, even from right there in the city where I was in Idaho. And like, what's the deal? Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. But I know that some of the, some of the photos from back home up in the valley that we've got a mountain area that's really close by that is like the valley for all the bunch of ski resorts and the pictures that came from those were the most brilliant colors. I just, of any of the ones I saw on social media, it was just, it was phenomenal. yeah they definitely have uh pretty low light pollution up there and so that's uh yeah that's one advantage for sure yeah we live in such a beautiful world I just I i I get more I marvel at some of the cool stuff that we get to experience we just had a eclipse and you know then this and and all of the stuff and we actually while we were there we went to what's the falls Name? Shoshone Falls. Shoshone Falls. It's Shoshone. It's an Indian tribe. Yeah. And it's supposed to be the Niagara Falls of the West, but it's like the really, really, really, really little brother. Yeah. Well, I guess I've never seen Niagara Falls, but that to me was quite impressive. It really was. There's a lot of people there enjoying the sights. And yeah, it's impressive. I mean, that's the Snake River that runs all across Idaho. And I don't know where it originates, but it's a pretty good volume of water and pretty impressive. Good morning, Karen. Hi, Karen Barnett. um okay well uh what do we we just have niada coming up uh if you haven't got your ticket you still can I i think that the when does the the discount on the the hotel end do you know remember Jim Collison, Yeah, I think it's coming up pretty soon. I think it's the 20th or 24th of this month. So I think 20th. And you know, we were looking at because because we went to the the Neo user summit, which was piggybacked with the buyer pair United conference, and they had that at Bellagio and And it's, for those of you that looked at hotel rooms at the Bellagio during that conference, they're substantially less than what that, that was too. So, which is, yeah, the win, it's, yeah, which is probably because they, they book a lot more rooms and all of that. But it is, I, I, earlier this summer, I was like pricing stuff out. It's like, okay. this and this and this and I was I was kind of shocked that about naida all the days added together were going to be about the same as the short conference and the the uh the win is fantastic we've enjoyed being there and so by all means we hope to see many of you there and yeah and then I've got a couple of v8 meetings this uh week um just a quick mention for those dealers who are in the 100 to 500 count range and they want to get in a v8 group please reach out to me right away because if you miss this meeting at the end of this week then um that we won't have another one, you know, until June. And so just- And a super, super easy data entry, you know, a couple of simple reports. But, you know, it's been fun to watch you continue to develop some of the ways of looking at the data and getting really good response on that. Yeah, we covered that. that on our podcast on Friday. Seems like a long time ago now after a weekend away. Yeah. Driving all the way up there and driving all the way back. Okay. So what are we talking about today? Today is around collections. So the title of the show, as folks can see is why some of your customers don't pay. So, you know, this is not so much, this is more on the, the behavioral side. As we've talked about this, there are so many different reasons and lots of different avenues to go. We're just going to talk about one part of this. Those of you guys who listen, we chit-chat a lot about buy here, pay here on our off work time. Last night before heading to bed and this morning, we were talking about more, because this is a topic that we've come up, we've talked about before and written down as one of the things we wanted to cover in the morning show, and others and other things. So, because it's a pretty rich conversation. It's, it's like encapsulates the thing that is crucial to to you know dealers yeah let's let's keep this kind of high level to start like and keep in mind she said we're going to be bringing others to this conversation going to be an ongoing kind of series around this particular topic why they don't pay and and again this is not this is looking more at the kind of the It's partly procedural and it's partly, it's mostly more like philosophical and behavioral. Yeah. Right? It's psychological. And I always, I mean, I come up with the same kind. We've talked before about how when people had extra money in their accounts, everyone paid more. So, you know, I just want to put that out there. Like, you know, when during COVID, when people were getting money, extra money in their accounts and, You talk to most dealers, and most dealers would say they had better collections, people paid during that period of time. And so what that says to me, and we'll kind of get into this, is frequently, they're not being able to pay is not a psychological thing. It's not a behavioral thing. It's a resources thing. Yeah, I can say that it's both. It's really a question of there's a lot of elements to this, right? And so I think in order for us to kind of keep the conversation focused, I really think for today, we'll delve into all these layers of this thing as we move forward here. But I think the piece that I'm most interested in covering today is just the thing about accountability. And of course, as coaches, Michelle and I live in a space where we kind of make our living often as coaches and coaches. accountability is something that comes up quite a bit. So if you think about for us as coaches working with dealers, it's like we come in and we spend some time with a dealer and we, you know, we offer some suggestions and they say, yes, that makes sense. We should do that. We used to do it. We stopped doing it, whatever. And then we get on a plane and fly back home. And then the question is how, what's the level of accountability? We said we wanted to do it. We wanted to implement it with our team and it didn't get implemented and So that's kind of how accountability is something that comes up with us a lot. And so we try to address it with the dealer on the front end. It's like if we don't have some way to implement the things that we're talking about doing, then it's not going to have any kind of lasting effect. And so when we think about that and we try to apply that in this customer collections realm, For me, it kind of goes back to, you remember when we had the Rick Reeves tribute episode some weeks ago? And a lot of the foundational education back there, I remember that the phrasing in some of that material was that the customer that we serve and buy here, pay here, will not pay on time unless we require them to do so. I remember that phrasing because it was taught to me way back. Most people would listen to that and it's like, well, duh. Yeah. and then what does that mean for you as a dealer? I mean, if they're not going to pay, if they're not required period. Um, but so how do you, how do you, I don't want to back up another step and add something else. Cause I think it'll kind of help frame the conversation. So I think, um, it's, it's really about, so I would change the language. Like I would update the language. If I were using my own phrasing to say the same thing that was in that material, I would say that the customer that we serve is, traditionally will not pay on time unless we are in a position to hold them accountable to doing so. Okay. What does being in a position to hold them accountable look like? Well, it's changing. So this is part of why, and this is why I wanted to get this part covered right out of the gate because all the other things that we can talk about, if, if we don't have the means to hold the customer to some standard, um, then the standard will get wider and wider and and the customer farther and behind and then I go back to what we all those of us who've been around the the industry for decades heard ken shilson say many times that those nabd conferences over the years and articles and whatever else He would say, let me make sure I say this right, I'm paraphrasing, but basically in the buy here, pay here world and customers payments, that 30 days is a lifetime, meaning past due, 30 days is a lifetime and 60 days is a charge off. Well, so that's why this delinquency conversation is so important. And a lot of our dealers, and of course, going back to our Friday conversation, we were offered another way to think about whether your portfolio is really performing. Some dealers would look at their delinquency and every Friday or Monday or whatever, and that's how they would make a determination of whether the business is performing well. And I would say delinquency is just one piece. And we've seen lots of dealers run with pretty consistently high delinquency and still collect just great. So it's back to definitions. Like what are we calling performance? What is good performance? What are good collection results? And now back to the Ken Shilson thing, it's like if you think 30 days is a lifetime, then what we have to really think about is how to keep the customer from falling into that hole. When they fall into a rut, what we also know about a poor credit consumer is often part of what puts them in a difficult credit spot is they're, they're tied on income. They can't manage all the stuff. They sometimes get over committed, right? This is all kind of, you know, broad generalizations, but that's what, that's what we're doing this morning. We're talking in general terms is, is really just thinking about the customer is struggling. You know, they, they have a finite amount of income. Life happens. Unexpected things happen. They have hard time juggling it all. So how will they make the decision to, about where they pay. And let me back up and I'm going to cover something that's tricky because I've often thought about this and I never got around to doing it. I did some research a couple of years ago again about a correlation between this human behavior and dog training. Okay. So let's be careful. Well, yes. And I correlate it to like, Children training. Okay. Parenting. Parenting. Because, you know, we, we talk about the knowledge gap and all that. And as we, as parents, we have to teach our kids. And so there are, you know, there are some similarities in that and, and, and it's not to disparage, but it's just to talk about how techniques work. Right. And yeah. Yeah. So I would just say folks hang with us. We'll connect all the dogs here. Like there's a, there's a correlation. Yeah. And this is not new to me because I, you know, I grew up on a farm and ranch and we had bird dogs. And so watching bird dogs be trained to do what they do, it was interesting. A fair amount of what they did was instinctive and, but you had to train them to do certain things and certain behaviors, how to, you know, certain things that you wanted them to perform. Right. So, so that part of the training and watching how that happens. And of course you, um, You can't talk about dog training without talking about reward and punishment, right? And you hear me talk about- Well, it's the same thing. It's any kind of trying to change a behavior. It's about you're going to have lasting results if there is a reward and that they'd rather have the reward than the punishment associated with it. You can do both. And we've talked about, and this is an important thing to consider in this context of accountability. Because in our buy here, pay here segment, it's been my observation across many years, is that in our space, we tend to lean on the punitive side. The punishment, I was going to say. And that does not... create very good relationships. Well, yeah, I can say that both can be useful. In other words, you know, you, so if you go back to parenting, I mean, most of us who have raised children know that it is sometimes necessary. Like it's just a necessary part of it to, to take some sort of punitive action, to child pay some sort of penalty for making a mistake or breaking the rules. And so same thing here. It's really, and the reason I bring it, the dog training thing is like when we were away this weekend, um, You know, with Michelle's family, they have one of those underground pet fences. They have a perimeter fence. And, you know, we've seen that, you know, people are using that. It's quite popular. And so the dog has a little collar. And the part that I think is interesting about that as much as anything, especially as it relates to what we're talking about here, is like... With a lot of those, you know that you can eventually take the actual shock collar off of the dog and replace it with a dummy collar. And the dog doesn't know that it won't still shock them, but you can take the electronics off of the collar. And so when you think about that, I was just really thinking about that in the context of watching that dog's behavior. You know, it roamed all around the house. You were able to have the doors open. The weather was nice and the dog was able to roam freely and they didn't worry about the dog running off. I even was trying to play fetch and I tossed it. And apparently, I mean, it was well within the grass, but it looked and it just looked back at me. It was like, I'm not going over there. And my brother was outside and he says, that must be where the dog's name was Lottie. It's naughty Lottie, um, where Lottie can start to hear the beeping. And so she'd prefer not to go anywhere near where the beeping starts. So, so she just looked at it and I ha I had to go fetch, which she just trained me. Um, yeah, don't, don't throw the ball. Don't throw the ball where I can't reach it. And I think, you know, the lesson here can be this, this dog is not mistreated. Like this dog is not, it's not, it's not been abused. It's a sweet dog, right? And so it behaves beautifully. Like it's, it's a, it's an easy going dog. But I guess the point is, There's a fence, there's a boundary, and we know the penalty for crossing the boundary. And I think the fascinating part about this in the context of our Buy Here, Pay Here business is, you know, as a former dealer myself, I can tell you, and I was telling you this morning, that there were plenty of times that I had conversations one-on-one with customers who would So let me back up and say customer makes 10 consecutive payments in a row. Maybe they're a biweekly payment and they make their first 10 payments just exactly as agreed. Why? Because we had a very clear conversation at the time they bought the car. Like this is part of it. This is a whole separate thing we're going to need to take on later. But it's like we have to first communicate to the customer very clearly the expectations, right? And then we either hold the customer accountable to that understanding. We go to all that trouble to paint those boundaries at the beginning. And we either hold the customer accountable to those boundaries or we do not. It's not great. Yes. Yes. And we were talking this morning about, you know, there's a lot to that as well. And I just wanted to, before we... Fahad is different forms of communication, work at different times, sometimes text, sometimes email, keep switching for whatever doesn't work. So, you know, I appreciate that. George is like consequences sound better than punishment, which is absolutely true as well. And we were, you know, we were talking about that, you know, that there's, you set the boundaries up, you educate and it's like, this is what is expected of you. And we'll be talking about this another time because Jim's like, not today, we're not gonna be going diving deep into this, but what is our level of accountability? And that's something we'll be talking about too, because there's a level of accountability for the customer, but you can't hold them accountable to something they don't understand. Absolutely. Good point. And so what is our level of accountability to helping them understand? So that's kind of the track I was on when I'm talking about the commerce. So let me just be the accountable dealer for a moment. one of my responsibilities as a dealer would be to do what I said we would do at the time of closing in my own dealership is we would have a very clear conversation at closing. It was typically a recorded message supplemented by some documents. And so, so in that thing, one thing we were doing was making sure the customer fully understood the terms and the bumpers. And so, so this is why I said it's different. Like it's changing. For me as a dealer, many of our customers paid in person back in those days. I was in the 2000s when I was a dealer. And this is a pain point for so many dealers because when we speak on this at different conferences, we get multiple that will ask a question about, in the day of ACH, in the day of this, how do we do this? Yeah. So this is part of what I want to try to get to. And if there's a takeaway that I would have for dealers today, I want to go back and say, okay. So let me just kind of say how I would translate the things that I would have done as a dealer and would recommend to dealers as a trainer coach is like, so closing is clear. No, no room for misunderstanding about that. Now it doesn't mean the customer's listening, but our, our, we've fulfilled our responsibility when we convey and we do the best we can to make sure that the customer understands that Kind of the ground rules here, the bumpers. Right. And so we're happy to help. And these are the boundaries. So now take that customer again who was 10 payments in a row on time. And now suddenly they don't show up on Friday. They get a text message on Friday night or a phone call. They don't show up. Maybe we talk to them on Saturday and they claim they'll be in whatever. But then they don't come in until Monday. And now you can say, well, that's just a couple of three days. It's not that big a deal because I just want our listeners to think about the think about the dynamics of what we're creating here and the behavior that happens when a customer just supposed to be there on Friday. All day Saturday went by. They didn't come in. Now they're there on Monday and they're coming in all smiles because we, we love each other. We've had a great relationship. Right. And so they think they're come in and everything's all rosy and they're just going to make their payment. Yeah. This is in the day when they would come in. Yeah. And so I'm just talking about how to translate what we would do when the, from an in-person situation. So our people were instructed. Yeah, so our people were instructed, cashiers, we don't take a payment from, I would notify them, you know, so-and-so, if so-and-so comes to make their payment or calls, I need to speak to them before we make the payment. So that's, you know, when I'm in a general manager kind of collection supervisor role, And I would speak to them. And so imagine the customers coming in and they're all smiles and they don't think anything's wrong, but, but let's think about what's going on in their mind. Like we just really need to go slow here and think about, because this is such a thing that doesn't get talked about enough. It's like, what is the customer thinking? The customer bought the car and we said, and I'm making it really extreme and exaggerated here for the sake of illustration, but it's like, I wrote an article years ago that just was the title of the article, something like somebody messed up. Oh, I thought you were going to talk about a different one. Friday means Friday. So the thing you talk about Friday means Friday is in the context of that article. It's called Somebody Messed Up. Okay, so somebody. So in this case, who messed up? Did I mess up as the dealer? Is there something I did there? So it's always we look at ourselves first. Is there something we did to contribute to that? And we have to decide, is it a big deal that the customer is now paying on Monday instead of Friday? So again, I'm making it really compressed here. And I think that what you're talking about, though, when they come in on Monday, and if they can come in and make the payment, or they can go ahead and do the ACA or send the money in or whatever, with no kind of conversation around that, then you've just set a new due date. sort of yeah because it's like oh that was easy so now and now the next time that it comes around it's like oh I'll just pay on monday yeah oh I'll just pay on monday well no there's something more there and this is why I say you got to really dig in and really make sure you understand so the customer strolls in thinking in their mind well I remember very clearly that you told me at the time that it was important that I talked to you if I couldn't be there on friday like you were very clear about that I remember and and I know jim and he was probably just like eye to eye you need to talk to me if there's a if there's a problem but yeah that word just always lands funny with me but I would say the customer I would just tell them you know, we expect you're going to be here on Friday if there's something. So you would leave it at, and we've never threatened repossession. That was just not, that's not part of the approach, but you would say to the customer, excuse me, I swallowed my water a little wrong, but I think what, basically what we'd be saying is this is the understanding. And so without threatening them, you would say, it's very important that we hear from you. Anytime you can't make a payment on Friday as agreed, it's going to be very important that we hear from you. So the emphasis is on communication. It's not the money. It's the emphasis is on communication. So now let's finish the thing about the customer comes strolling in on Monday. Dude. And they know, they remember that the understanding was Friday. They know they're late. And they want to just come in and say, well, I had a weekend at the casino or weekend at the lake. And they want to be able to say, oh, no big deal. Sorry. You know, I'm just a couple of days late. They want to be able to pay that and go on about their day, which is part of think about how it works whenever you have a drop box or in our case, an online portal to be able to make a payment. Right now in 2024, they can make a payment in a lot of these different ways. Or think about just the dynamics of just a Dropbox. So years ago, dealers, the question was, should I have a Dropbox or not? Well, that customer on Monday could come in Monday morning before you open, slide a payment in the payment Dropbox and not suffer any consequences. I'm either going to, I'm probably just going to, as a dealer, I'm just going to post the payments and there are no consequences to use George's word. Right. And so this is where I think we have to really break this down and start to think about how do we begin to solve this? How do we create a better dynamic? in our collection department, because the part that I'm saying that I would pull the customer aside before the payment was posted, you know, Hey, Billy, can I talk to you a minute? Come on, come on my office for just a minute. Let's talk before they could actually pass money. It was like, Oh crap. I would have them come talk to me. And when, when they came to talk to me, the conversations were more like kind of the nice principal in high school or something, you know, everybody knew they were mean, but the vice principal was usually over disciplined. And so you didn't want to get a conversation with a vice principal, but yeah. Yeah. Well, I said the nice principal. So it's like the, you know, I'm still a nice person. Yes. I, I have punitive measures that everybody's heard about. But in this case, when I pull, you know, Billy in this example into the office and say, Hey Billy, why didn't we hear from you on Friday? And I should be quiet. Okay. So those of you who know Jim understand that he has mastered the art because it is a skill to be able to ask a question and then sit in silence because nine times out of 10, 9.5 times out of 10, 9.9 times out of 10 is that the customer is the one that's going to talk first. Well, they're going to in this case. Yeah. But I mean, yeah. So I'm just going to, I'm just, so, so again, I'm not, I'm not chewing them out. I'm saying, you know, it's not, dang, you're supposed to be here on Friday and I'm not chewing them out. I'm asking a question and I'm so, but what's really happening is I'm pulling them in the office and I'm saying, Hey Billy, how come we didn't hear from you on Friday? And you just wait and you find out. So what, what happened? So think about, you can imagine what that next three minutes is like. It's a short conversation, but imagine what that three minutes is like whenever I hold a customer accountable, because that article that she's talking about, I said in there, Friday means Friday. That is our understanding. I haven't changed the understanding. It feels like you're trying to change the understanding. And as far as I'm concerned, we still have an understanding for Friday. So I'm going to have a conversation and say, so what happened? And of course, Billy's going to have a story to tell and he's going to explain. But without me saying really a word, Billy's going to come to conclude that I still expect the payments on Friday. And so as Billy leaves, so I can expect your payment to be on time next Friday. And so just leave it at that. I'm just asking questions. I'm not chastising even really. I'm just asking questions. How come we didn't hear from you? And so I think this is something that we're kind of losing in our industry because customer can pay online three days late, five days late. I'm just telling you, if there's no consequence, Like if there's no fence at the perimeter anymore, then the customer will what's three days late now. And there's no consequence. Oh, I say back when I bought the car, they told me it was really important. I get my payments in on Friday. Well, this one, I waited three days and didn't pay it till Monday. And there was no consequence. That's all talk. And that's the thing is, and actually we, Mark chimed in and says, what you're telling them is that paying on Monday itself is paying on, if paying on time is okay. Yeah. Yeah. And if you can't pay on time, you must contact us and make a payment arrangement. Communication is the key to this training. Yeah. I'm glad Mark is here. I've never had a chance to meet Mark, but our careers have kind of just intersected. He and I were in the same place at different times. And I look forward to getting to know you, Mark. I appreciate you chiming in here because it's absolutely right. It's the part that I'm trying to speak to. I just don't hear it talked about enough. And I'm saying the way customers pay has changed. And I hear a lot of people saying, it's just going to be like that and it is but it doesn't mean that because I think we we're in a dangerous place when we allow customers to who who need some discipline that they need to understand and just going back to your parenting example you wouldn't have to pick up very many parenting books when you would find you'd be barely three pages in before they would talk about children They appreciate boundaries. They do. They appreciate knowing what the boundaries are. So when things are just no boundaries, then it's a little helter skelter and it's kind of uncomfortable place to be. And I would say I can extend the same basic argument to the customers that we serve. They need to know the boundaries. And it doesn't mean. So, again, my boundaries were not about money. My boundaries were about communication. So had this customer called in and said, hey, I'm going to be away for the weekend and whatever. I won't be able to get in there until Monday. It would have been totally worked out, probably would have been a signature, and now we can easily get a signature. That part is so much easier. That we will make an exception for this week, and then the next week we're back on track, right, Billy? Yeah. But going back to Mark's comment, it's like this is like when we don't set those ground rules, it's like now suddenly they conclude that, oh, well, Monday must be okay. Yeah. Yeah, and George actually asked the question that George pipes in and he says, is there any reason that the same conversation can't be virtual? I would say no. And that I'm wondering, and I'm not as familiar with some of the payment processing softwares. Do they have the ability to, if they're late, to not accept a payment without a call? I can't say. I mean, that to me would be something. It's tricky. You get into some legal stuff here about refusing a payment. Like, I don't think we should try to cover that as non-attorneys. Or like when they get into it, it's like it just automatically routes them to talk to someone. Because I mean, I think that that's kind of common that when you you know, if you're something like that, that it'll just automatically route you to now you're you're not talking to the regular whatever that you're now talking to a different a different department because there was something within your understanding that isn't being fulfilled. Again, I think you're getting into legal grounds here that I think it is possible in some systems to be able to say that your account gets locked after a certain time. You can't make the payment through the web portal or whatever you call this number, right? And I don't know, when you go people watching, which is a fun activity, especially if you're in Vegas and we've got something coming up, you see a lot of people, all different economic groups, classes, whatever, that people FaceTime all the time. And so to FaceTime is not... is not a, it's not hard for people to just, you know, to talk to someone because they talk to friends. We have a trail right outside our house and every once in a while I'll see someone that's out there, you know, they got their phone up, they're walking and they're talking to someone, you know, and looking up, but it's like they take them with them. So that kind of technology for most of our customers is just easy, but most dealers won't do it. Yeah, and I'm not... For today, I don't really care how the dealer communicates. I think my point is, and George, in my mind, it can absolutely be virtual. Whether it's actual virtual camera meeting or it's a phone call, my point is really this. When the customer... Again, let's keep it really short windows and let's kind of make it extreme to better understand what's happening when my customer and let's just say I don't meet this customer in person. They always pay virtually. That's an ACH payment or whatever that they pay on time consecutively. Brand new relationship with the customer. The very first time that the customer does not pay on time. This is so important that we pay attention to that. And the very first time the customer does not pay as agreed. what's going to happen? Well, let me just tell you what's going to happen if Jim is the collection supervisor. Somebody is going to call the customer after the payment's been made. We're going to call the customer. They're probably going to answer the phone. Why? Because they know they made their payments. So they know they're not in trouble. They're going to say, hey, I made my payment. And we're going to ask them the same things that I would be doing in person. Say, hey, we just called to find out, is there something going on? Like to me, this is the nice principle. I'm asking a question. We saw that you didn't make your payment. This is the first time that you've been past due. You paid like three days late. Is there something going on? Like, is there something, what's going on? How come you didn't make the payment, you know, on the regular payment date as agreed? Get quiet. Wait, wait, ask them what's going on. It's like we just talk too much. Can you tell? The silence is a little bit awkward, isn't it? And Jim knows me. It's like super awkward for me. And so that's been a really hard thing to learn. Just anyway, like in management and all of that, that when you're having a difficult conversation with a team member or whatever, a customer, a team member, it's just like you ask the question. Not like you did it, but it's like, Hey, yeah. What happened? So let me just kind of tie some of this stuff together. And I know, I know we're running a little bit long, but I think this is that important. We need to stay here and kind of finish out the thought. Like if this customer pays three days late without paying, The slightest consequence. And I'm not having somebody call them. I'm not having a collector who's the account manager call them and chew them out. Collector is going to call them and say, hey, we saw that you didn't get your payment in on time. Is there something going on? Is there something we need to adjust or what happened? and learn to be quiet, let them speak and explain themselves. But here's what folks who've been doing this while know that this is the reality. When we allow that customer to pay three days late without any consequence at all, then three days becomes five days, five days becomes 10 days, And now it's the next paycheck. So now you're 14 days on a biweekly. And you're just a short step. You're a short step. When that customer falls behind, we already said this customer is struggling financially. So I would say there's an argument to hear. And I absolutely believe this. When I say it, this is me being genuine. The The reality is I believe I'm helping this customer when I hold them accountable to that. And I tell them I still. So, again, I'm just asking the question, you know, how come we didn't hear from you on Friday? They naturally conclude from that that I still expect the payment on Friday. Right. But it's form of a question. And now they're going to they're going to answer that and they're going to go away saying, oh, they meant it. They told me at the time of delivery that. They expected payments in on Friday or communication. And so just a reminder when I talk to them, don't forget if there's ever a time that you can't pay on time, just remember you got to communicate with us. Let us know. And I'm still holding accountable that because when I let them become three and five, they're sliding into a hole that they're going to find, they're going to find it difficult to recover from. And I'm not one to wanting to defer payments. So I'm going to want them to catch up. And now that becomes even more difficult for them. So in a way, I'm holding them accountable in a way that helps them to be successful. And I don't say that to them, but I know that we're working to create a situation where they're not slipping farther and farther behind. And it doesn't matter the income level. It doesn't matter the price of the car. It doesn't matter how much down payment the customer gave us. If we're in a three-year business relationship with somebody who doesn't manage money very well, hasn't traditionally, go back and look at their credit report. Traditionally, they have not managed money very well and they haven't always been successful in their accounts. One of the ways they're going to be successful in a different way with us is because of this accountability piece we're talking about. We're going to hold them accountable. We're going to be nice about it. We're going to phrase it in the form of a question, ask them, you know, how come they didn't don't. And then just remember, don't forget if there's something comes up, we're going to ask you to communicate, let us know what's going on. And so the customer comes away with, This idea, okay, I guess I better go back to Friday, right? Oh, yeah. Now, when we have that conversation, because I saw it time and time again, and our friends like Tommy Brandes and dealers out there, they can confirm. I may have that conversation with Billy on payment number 11 and guess what? Billy may get back on track and it might never be late again, but they certainly might go many months of not a problem at all. Why? Because I just held them to that standard. It's accountability. And so it's why if we don't have some degree of accountability, the customer is going to take advantage. They're going to stretch and stretch and stretch and you're going to get stories and fibs and they're going to make up all the reasons. So we have to hold them accountable. And so the other layer of that, and we can cover that separately another time is, accountability to that story. When they call and say, Hey, I need more time, you know, because of X, we have to hold them accountable to verify the story that they're telling us. And it's uncomfortable. It's like, you know, we're, we're basically saying we can try to get you some time, but I'm going to need some verification. And this is kind of people will say, ah, it's old school. Well, guess what? We collected well in the old days. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's two things. And then I had a comment, too, that I want to make. Karen piped in and says, silence is so hard, but important, powerful. Buy her pair of collections. Great comments and podcast comments, too. And then Mark piped in again and says, when we are discussing a payment problem, we used to say, help me help you to build the relationship part of the collections effort. And, you know, that's like super important. But I, you know, I want to point something out. There's a difference between talking at someone and talking with someone. And, you know, you in relationship type things, we watch this really, really cute show called Love on the Spectrum. Yeah. And if anybody has had a chance to, I think it's Netflix, adorable, but they have this relationship expert come in and talk to these people because they, to people that are on the spectrum, because there are certain things that they take quite literally and they have to learn. And so she teaches them, don't ask yes or no questions. And so you ask open-ended questions so you're not just going to get, so like, do you like vanilla ice cream? Yes or no. But to say, what kind of ice cream do you like the best? And then they say, and then it's like, well, why kind of thing. And so to, to when you're having the conversation and you're leaving it open-ended, don't have them sit down and say you're late. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's in the form of a question. Yeah. But it's also there's a tone. And this is why I say it's really important. If I come to that, because what Mark is alluding to there, help me help you, that's crossing into what we call advocacy. We were talking about that this morning. If I think of myself, and we talk very specifically about an actual role in a dealership called a customer advocate. You can find the podcast we did months ago. We've talked multiple times on this. So what Mark is talking about there is kind of this, let's just call it a tone of advocacy. advocacy, if I'm a collector and, and, and again, that, that culture in our collection department, through the dealer, through the collection supervisor, into the collectors, if I'm a collector working for a dealer who truly believes what I believe, which is, I believe I'm helping the customer when I ask these questions and I hold them accountable to the thing. And I, and I'm, and I'm just trying to keep them from digging themselves a deeper hole and, I may or may not use those phrases when I speak to the customer, but if my tone and my approach to the thing is I'm really trying to help them. I'm really trying to help them to avoid slipping into a deeper place because we know 30 days is a lifetime, 60 days is a charge off. We know if they slip on that slippery slope, it's a bad outcome usually. And so when we can avoid having them slip too far down that slope and then we can keep them on a track of success. And so this is, I think it is a key difference. And when you look at successes and failures in buy, hear, pay, or contracts, I think a lot of it can be attributed to accountability. And we can do it with a smile on our face. We can do it just like whether we're raising children or training dogs. And we can also incorporate a lot more of the reward element. So that would be the flip side of this. Accountability sometimes is in the context of something punitive. And I'm simply suggesting we can work in the reward side of it too, but we just really want to. And so what would happen in that conversation back to Billy in the dealership years ago, and to have a conversation with Billy and Billy goes ahead and posts his payment and he, and he comes in next Friday on the due date as agreed. And we reward him. We say, hey, great to see you. Glad to see you. Whatever. But you just affirm it. You reward it and acknowledge it. That's that whole, you know, we talked about the training, is that there's a consequence that you have to make sure that you're willing to follow through on. Mm-hmm. And, um, you know, there is a consequence associated with it, but there's also after they've experienced the consequence, there's lots of loving that's given. And it's like, and because that's, that's an important part of training. It's like when you do good or when you, you know, the consequence and it's like, love you still love you. Let's, you know, let's do the, let's, let's, uh, um, uh, communicate next time so that this doesn't happen. And, you know, we can, that we're here to, we're here to, um, to help if there's something that's happening, but yeah. Well, I think, you know, it's again, and we kind of wrap up there because the rest of it's, you know, there's, there's so much more to cover and we'll dig into it, but I think we don't start from this baseline of accountability. It's true. You've got to have that understanding that all the stuff we can talk about, all the techniques and technology and all the stuff, you can implement all that stuff. But unless you have some way to hold the customer accountable to the understanding, then they're going to take advantage. That's what their pattern shows. Go back and look at their credit report. They've made a history of telling stories, buying time. And it becomes a deeper and deeper hole and it's a bigger story. And the next thing you know, you're in a repo and charge off. So we understand you can hold customer accountable through a repossession. But my gosh, that's a serious step. You can disable the car with a starter. That's so serious. It is. And it's putting you at risk as a dealer. It's putting you at risk every time you do that. You're putting yourself at risk of some sort of ramifications, some repercussions from that because it gets mishandled or whatever. and as some so I'm saying yes of course we all understand that repossessions are part of accountability I'm I'm going back to brent carmichael's thing let's collect the cash not the car let's yeah let's so um in rick reeves terminology it was repossessed the customer it's like we gotta we gotta quit thinking about that GPS devices being a silver bullet. And that's how we're going to hold people accountable is just yank the car. No, we can do way better than that. And so we can learn to hold customers accountable long before we're ever in that position. Yeah. So moral of the story is what I, well, I'm kind of going to say that there's a moral of the story is, you know, first time they're late. have a conversation with them as soon as you get the payment and ask the question, what happened? And just be quiet and let them, let them answer and be really happy to see them the next time or whatever. Yeah. Just got to stand the ground a little bit and make sure they know Friday still, our agreement is still Friday. Yeah. Yeah. And, and we do, we, we live in a new era and so it's, we got to get creative and being able to stay connected with our, with our customers too. So, and we, you know, we'll be talking more about customer advocacy and all of that and future episodes as well. Send a drone to leave a note. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Well, Hey guys, happy Monday. I hope you guys have a great rest of your day. Thank you so much for making part of your Monday, part of your morning. uh, including us in it. So we, uh, yeah, just have a great, have a great rest of your day. It's a month. It's a May. We'll see you back there. Wednesday.
