Wes Kaplan 
Civil filings in court categories that include debt-collection and contract claims rose sharply across California in fiscal year 2024-25. Across 51 counties with comparable data, filings increased 27.3 percent, from 245,676 to 312,831. New insights by The Kaplan Group identify where that activity is growing fastest. Monterey, Madera, and Placer led percentage growth among counties … Read more
When a small business finishes a job but agrees to be paid later, it is lending money to its customer. U.S. businesses held $6.5 trillion in unpaid customer invoices in the second quarter of 2026. This is more than twice the $3.0 trillion in commercial and industrial loans held by U.S. banks. The business pays … Read more
California business bankruptcy filings have risen for four straight years, but the increase is uneven. Los Angeles added the most cases, while Sacramento and San Francisco posted the fastest growth among counties with at least 50 prior-year filings. Orange County moved in the opposite direction, recording the state’s largest numerical decline. A new report by … Read more
At The Kaplan Group, we have long contended that unpaid invoices are not simply accounting problems. Yes, they represent cash flow gaps that can turn into hard writeoffs. But beneath these entries are relationship issues that must be resolved before back debt can be recovered. This insight drives every step we take in recapturing large … Read more
On September 28, 2024 Governor Newsom signed SB 988, the Freelance Worker Protection Act, and its key provisions became law on January 1, 2025. The FWPA creates baseline contract and payment protections for many freelancers and small one-person contracting entities, and it gives freelancers tools to enforce those rights. Who’s covered The law defines a … Read more
When Lhoist North America hired Chris Soignier as Credit Manager in 2012, senior management recognized that they wanted to better control risk and reduce DSO. They had just made DSO one of the variables that impacted bonuses for sales people, but there was still much to do in order to achieve their objectives. Chris identified … Read more
The easiest time to get a personal guaranty is when a business is first asking for credit. It is very easy to include this provision on a credit application as described in our free eBook, The Credit Application Handbook. Many business owners will sign a personal guaranty just because it is on the form. Alternatively, … Read more
Arguments occur all too often, whether with a debtor who is disputing a debt, or a co-worker, manager, employee, or spouse. Anyone who is in an argument really wants to win. Frequently in an argument the parties get very emotional and winning is more important than the issue itself. More often than not, neither side actually … Read more
Here’s the premise: Good questions directly lead to greater success in life and career; Most people ask bad questions (myself included). We are constantly solving problems on the job, including making the sale. We need to collect information to solve these problems. How we ask questions greatly influences the answers and our eventual success. Better … Read more
The Kaplan Group, Inc. is pleased to announce that the Kaplan Group Annual Scholarship of $1,000 has been awarded to Stephen Lyons, a first year graduate student at the University of Georgia and a candidate for a Master of Accountancy. A main goal of the scholarship was to expose students to career opportunities in credit … Read more
Write Offs Can Be Part Of A Profit Maximization Strategy No one wants bad debt. Everyone hates it when you do not get paid. But, is it possible that never having had a bad debt is a sign of a problem? Absolutely! Over the last few weeks, I’ve heard these comments from a few CFOs: … Read more
The Kaplan Group As we’ve explained many times in our previous posts, delinquent and non-paying customers and accounts can have a very serious effect on the health of your business. Obviously, when a customer orders a product or service and then doesn’t pay for it, your business suffers – so how can these delinquencies be … Read more
Learning to effectively collect debts, whether commercial (business-to-business) or consumer (debts owed by individuals) requires patience and diligence. The best debt collectors have honed their skills over years, learning what strategies tend to push debtors towards making payments. For new debt collectors who haven’t yet had time to develop their collection techniques, however, there are … Read more
While knowing when to send a past-due account to a collection agency is sometimes difficult, it is important to keep in mind that the sooner an agency has an account and can begin collecting on it, the more likely they are to successfully recover your money. There are multiple reasons to send a claim to … Read more
While telephone is still the most effective way to communicate with debtors during a debt collection effort, other forms of correspondence including email can play an important role in a debt collector‘s efforts to contact a non-paying customer. When using email for collection purposes, it is important to follow some general guidelines to ensure your … Read more
As we’ve mentioned in previous blog posts, credit fraud is a fairly significant problem for many businesses across the country. A customer will place a large order with no intent to pay for it, and unless your credit department is diligent in their credit analysis of potential customers, you may be left with a large … Read more
One of the most important aspects of debt collection is knowing how to negotiate effectively with debtors. Learning to negotiate is not an easy process, and certainly requires practice, but anybody who’s already working as a debt collector has likely had time to develop their negotiation techniques to some extent at least. With this in … Read more
Anybody who’s worked in debt collection has probably had a debtor request either a payment plan or a settlement in order to take care of their delinquent account. While the best-case-scenario in debt collection is to receive a full payment on the unpaid balance, this simply isn’t possible in every case. Settlements and payment plans … Read more
During almost every debt collection effort, a debt collector can expect to hear at least one excuse from a debtor on why payment hasn’t been received already. While sometimes the debtor is being honest in their explanation, more often than not these excuses are employed as a means of delaying the collection process in hopes … Read more
If you’ve been reading our blog, you probably already saw our recent post with tips for debt collection. Today’s post will provide some more tips to help your collectors work more efficiently, allowing your business or collection agency to reap the greatest benefits from your collection efforts. Here’s some more advice for your debt collectors, … Read more