An invoice goes past due. You send a reminder, then another. Accounting says the check runs next cycle. Two cycles later your emails aren’t getting answered at all — and you’re still trying to decide whether this is a collections problem or just a slow customer.
Here’s the short answer: place the account when it stops behaving like a slow payer and starts behaving like a non-payer. That’s a change in behavior, not a number on a calendar — silence after a specific promise, a dispute that appears only once you escalate, a token partial payment with no plan attached, a new entity name on the remittance. Sixty to ninety days past due with no credible payment plan is the usual rule of thumb, but the behavior is the real signal, and waiting past it costs you leverage, not just time.
Nobody can honestly tell you what a particular account will recover. What can be said plainly is that the tools which work on a debtor who has decided not to pay are mostly not tools you have in-house — and on contingency, using them costs nothing unless they work.
First, run the in-house sequence properly
Most “we tried everything” files have not actually been worked. Before you place anything, do these four things. They cost nothing, and they either get you paid or they tell you what you’re really dealing with.
1. Confirm the debt is clean. Is the invoice undisputed, and can you prove it? Signed contract or purchase order, proof of delivery or completed work, the invoice itself, and the payment history. A documented debt is a collectable debt. An undocumented one is an argument.
2. Get off the AP inbox. Reach the person who authorizes payment — owner, controller, CFO. A surprising number of “ignored” invoices are sitting with someone who has no authority to pay them and no incentive to say so.
3. Send one firm written demand, with a date. Not a fifth reminder. State the amount, list the documents behind it, name the date, and say what happens on that date. One demand you mean beats a dozen you don’t.
4. Stop extending credit. Don’t ship the next order or start the next phase while the balance ages. Continuing to work is the clearest signal you can send that the balance isn’t urgent.
If that sequence produces payment or a signed plan that’s actually kept, you’re done — and you kept the customer. Our in-house collections vs. agency comparison covers where each approach genuinely wins. The important part is that the sequence has an end. The expensive mistake in commercial credit is rarely the bad debt itself; it’s the bad debt worked casually for six months.
The signals it’s a non-payer, not a slow payer
Slow payers pay. Non-payers manage you. The tells are behavioral, and any single one is enough:
- Silence after a specific promise. Not “hasn’t replied yet” — they named a date, the date passed, and they went quiet.
- A broken payment plan. The first missed installment is the whole answer.
- A dispute that surfaces only after you escalate. Real quality or quantity disputes appear at delivery, not after a demand letter. A dispute born in month four is usually a stall.
- The invoice keeps needing to be “resubmitted.” New AP contact, wrong PO, lost paperwork, wrong portal — repeatedly.
- A token partial payment with no plan attached. Often bought to reset your patience rather than to reduce the balance.
- “The check is in the mail” with no check number. Ask for the number and the date mailed. A refusal to give either is itself information.
- The entity is moving. A new assumed name, a different company on the remittance, principals answering the phone under a new banner.
- You’re not the only one. Other vendors in your industry are chasing the same company.
- They want more work while the balance ages. That isn’t a customer; that’s you providing financing.
These line up closely with the list in when to send a commercial account to collections — the short version being that the age of a debt matters less than the behavior behind it.
A hypothetical, to make the pattern concrete: a supplier’s customer misses net-30, promises payment “after the 15th,” goes quiet on the 16th, and then — three weeks after a demand letter — raises a quantity dispute over a delivery that was signed for months earlier. Nothing in that sequence is a cash-flow hiccup. It’s a decision, and the decision was made before the dispute was.
What actually changes when you place the account
Placement is not the same emails on angrier letterhead. Several things change materially.
The file leaves your relationship. You can’t credibly name consequences for a customer you’re still hoping to keep, and debtors read that instantly. A third party has no such conflict — and your AR staff stop spending salaried hours on a file that has stopped responding to them.
Investigation you can’t buy retail. Skip tracing and asset work run on licensed investigative databases and court-record access that aren’t sold to a creditor chasing one invoice: locating principals who moved, identifying the operating bank, finding the successor entity that took the assets and left the debt behind, and establishing whether there is anything there to collect at all. That last one has real value too — knowing an account is genuinely uncollectable lets you stop paying to chase it.
Escalation on a documented record. Every contact, promise, and broken promise gets logged in a file that reads consistently and can support enforcement later. Legitimate consequences get named accurately: documented escalation, commercial credit reporting where the agency offers it, and a real path to judgment through counsel. There’s a hard line between naming a consequence you will actually pursue and threatening one you won’t — the second is unprofessional, it’s ineffective once a professional debtor has heard it twice, and it’s where in-house efforts most often lose their footing.
Field contact. A collector standing in the lobby asking for accounts payable is harder to route to voicemail than an email is to delete. That’s the part of this business we’re built around: when other collectors give up, we show up.
A path to court that doesn’t start with you writing a retainer check. Lawsuits, liens, and judgment enforcement are legal work. ASA is a collection agency, not a law firm, so those steps are handled by licensed attorneys in the debtor’s jurisdiction — we never engage in the unauthorized practice of law — and any court costs are reviewed with you before anything is filed.
And the clock keeps running the whole time. Most Texas commercial contract and open-account claims run four years from accrual (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.004) — see the statute of limitations breakdown. Lien rights, where you have them, can lapse in months.
What placement doesn’t change
The honest limits, because an agency that won’t name them isn’t being straight with you:
- A genuine dispute is a legal question, not a collection file. If your customer has a real, documented breach or quality claim, that belongs in negotiation, mediation, or court — not in a collections queue. A pretextual dispute raised to stall is a different animal, and it’s usually easy to tell which you have.
- An insolvent debtor with no assets stays insolvent. Investigation can surface hidden assets, personal guarantees, and successor entities — or confirm there’s nothing to reach.
- A thin file stays thin. No written terms, no proof of delivery, no signature. Invoices plus a clear email trail are often workable, but the weaker the paper, the harder every step becomes.
- An expired limitations period is generally the end of the road. Which is the argument for calendaring it early rather than discovering it late.
How contingency pricing actually works
The reason to place an account isn’t that an agency is cheap. It’s that the comparison was never fee-versus-free — it’s recovered money minus a fee versus a write-off.
Contingency means:
- No retainer, no setup fee, no monthly minimum. Nothing out of pocket to place an account.
- The fee comes only out of funds actually recovered. No recovery, no fee — literally.
- The rate is quoted before you place anything. It varies with the size, age, and complexity of the account, which is why you should get it in writing rather than off a rate card.
- Court costs, if litigation is warranted, are discussed in advance — separately from the contingency rate, and never as a surprise.
Anything resembling an upfront fee, a monthly maintenance charge, or a “success fee” stacked on top of contingency deserves a hard question.
Three more questions worth asking any agency you’re considering:
- “Do you work commercial B2B accounts specifically, or mostly consumer debt?” They’re different disciplines under different rules — business-to-business debt sits outside the consumer FDCPA (15 U.S.C. § 1692a(5)), and an agency built for consumer files is working from the wrong playbook.
- “Are you bonded in Texas?” Third-party collectors here are required to carry a $10,000 surety bond (Tex. Fin. Code § 392.101).
- “Who does your legal work, and are they licensed where the debtor is?” The answer should be licensed attorneys in that jurisdiction, and the costs should be spelled out before anything gets filed.
An agency that can’t answer those plainly has told you something useful.
What to have ready when you place it
- The invoice or invoices, plus the full payment history
- The contract, purchase order, or signed terms
- Proof of delivery or completed work
- Your own collection record — emails, call notes, the demand letter and its date
- Anything you know about the debtor: principals, other locations, bank, affiliated entities
The stronger the file, the faster the first real conversation happens.
Where we fit
Alexander, Strauss & Associates handles B2B debt collection — business-to-business commercial accounts only, never consumer debt. 25+ years, $250M+ recovered for clients, 2,500+ accounts resolved, and a 70%+ recovery rate on accounts we accept. We work on contingency, we do field contact instead of call-center dialing, and legal escalation runs through licensed attorneys.
We’ll also tell you when an account isn’t worth pursuing. That’s the part of a free review most people don’t expect and most need.
Have an account that’s stopped moving? Get a free case review — no recovery, no fee. This article is general information for commercial creditors, not legal advice. Limitations periods and enforcement options depend on your contract, your documentation, and where the debtor is — confirm yours with qualified counsel.
General information for commercial creditors, not legal advice. Laws and deadlines change and depend on the facts — confirm specifics with qualified counsel.