Delivering positive outcomes and £4m in collections for large energy company

The challenge

Our client, one of the UK’s largest energy companies, had a substantial stock of final / closed accounts with aged outstanding balances. These customers were choosing not to engage despite the client having made numerous previous contact attempts including prolonged third-party debt collection agency (DCA) activity.

The client wanted to understand if significant value had been left on the table by both internal and DCA activity and if accounts could be identified by Just that were appropriate for litigation and enforcement activity and could drive additional positive net collections.

The solution

Just undertook a rigorous portfolio analysis and treatment selection to help the client understand and segment a portfolio of over 100,000 customers. Given many of these customers no longer lived at the supply or last known address, Just’s analysis also included comprehensive trace activity to identify the customers’ likely whereabouts.

Just applied its proprietary LitigationScore to identify accounts suitable for litigation, where the customer had the means to pay, but for some reason was choosing not to engage to clear the outstanding balance. Just worked closely with the client and their incumbent litigation provider to ensure the customers received effective and fair treatment based on ability to pay.

For accounts unresolved by the litigation activity, Just provided a fully managed High Court enforcement service, using its ready-to-go network of enforcement suppliers and agents.

The results

The client was delighted with the results. The customer engagement rate and collections performance far exceeded their expectations.

• High contact rates: 54% of customers engaged during the litigation and enforcement stages
• Payments increased: 35% made payment at litigation and 43% at enforcement
• Total collections to date have already exceeded £4.3m (including cash and plan benefit across all stock segments)
• Low complaints

The success of this initial project has progressed to a multi-year flow engagement on both live and final accounts.