What is a Collections Manager?

What is a collections manager, and what do they do?

Let’s start off by making sure you’re in the right place with this job overview. There’s a collections manager (with an “s”) and a collection manager. One works with museum collections and the other is responsible for collecting money for companies.

A collection (without the “s”) manager ensures the proper care and preservation of objects within cultural institutions such as museums, libraries, and archives.

But we’re not talking about that job title. We’re talking about collections managers, the people that oversee the financial collection department of a company and are responsible for the accurate invoicing of clients and the timely receiving of payments.

For us at HappyAR, this is a very important role as it includes a lot of people that use our SaaS product every day to make their job run smoothly and to improve the financial performance and growth initiatives of their company.

To give you a better understanding of this role, should you be interested in hiring for it or apply for an open position, these are some of the strategic and tactical responsibilities that collections managers often do and will be found on job descriptions:

Job Descriptions:

• This position is responsible for the design and implementation of processes to improve cash flow and reduce receivables.
• Monitors and negotiates the collection of overdue accounts.
• Often recruits, trains, and oversees one or more account receivable clerks or associates.
• Provide appropriate timelines to internal and external clients to ensure that expectations and turnaround times are met.
• Approves partial payments and time extensions for existing accounts within designated limits of authority.
• Works closely with clients, finance management, and account management teams to build effective relationships to refine and streamline the A/R process with new technologies and workflows.
• Manages relationships with technology vendors and third-party collection agencies.

How Much are Collections Manager Salaries in the United States?

According to Salary.com, the Credit and Collections Manager’s average salary is $98,065 as of 2021, but the range typically falls between $85,019 and $112,866. Salary ranges can vary widely depending on many important factors, including education, certifications, additional skills, the number of years you have spent in the profession.

There are some common attributes of this role that our team at HappyAR has seen with our clients and can often be found in collections supervisor’s job descriptions.

• Highly effective interpersonal and communication skills and can produce or edit copy that is proven to result in faster collections.
• Highly effective organizational skills. Able to provide on-demand evaluations of staff, processes, technologies, and current results.
• Exceptional analytical skills and the ability to make rapid decisions
• Often have well over 5 years of experience with the management of collections staff members. Over 10 years of total management experience is not uncommon.
• Almost always has a bachelor’s degree and it’s not uncommon to see people in this role with a master’s degree including an MBA. For those with a high school diploma, starting in an account receivable
• Is well versed in company policies on communication with customer accounts, debt collection rules, collection processes and collection policies, and the management of a collections team.
• As with many finance-related fields, proficiency in Excel is very common.

Best Places to Find Full-Time Collections Manager Jobs:

• Indeed
• LinkedIn
• Glassdoor
• Google for Jobs
• CareerBuilder
• Monster
• FlexJobs
• LinkUp
• SimplyHired
• ZipRecruiter

How a Collections Manager Can Benefit From Accounts Receivable Technology Like HappyAR:

• The manager can have complete visibility into all collections activities being performed by the team. This visibility can extend to executive management, the sales team, and even select external vendors. The collections manager would serve as the administrator and can adjust who can see what in the account.
• There’s an extensive library of proven workflows and communication copy that can be quickly customized to fit the collections manager’s organization. This saves a lot of time and training resources when new associates are needed. They can simply be trained on using a system like HappyAR and they are able to start safely communicating with clients right away.
• These workflows have custom triggers that adjust actions based on what the recipient does. For example, if an email is opened, but not replied to, a follow-up is sent two days later.
• Workflows automatically end when a credit card, ACH, wire, or paper check payment is updated in the accounting system or can be manually paused or completed.
• The collections manager will now have a fully exportable activity audit trail that can be sent to collections companies and your law firm for the most challenging debts.

Additional benefits:

• A collections manager will have a bird’ eye view of the entire past due invoice workload. They can easily track historical performance and see what may need additional efforts.
• Because a collections manager is typically involved in technology purchases related to that function, seamless integrations are super easy. HappyAR integrates to the best of the best FinTech to give your accounts receivables a big boost. Most accounting, ERP, CRM, and invoicing systems connect with HappyAR and pull data over automatically. This eliminates redundant data entry from team members and helps to keep everything automatically updated around the clock.
• The same is true for communication technology. HappyAR also integrates with major email providers and continues to add integration functionality to voice and social media communication channels creating a seamless omni-communication channel.

HappyAR is a seamless SaaS that quickly and easily boosts your accounts receivables work. We save companies of all sizes thousands of dollars each year by optimizing the speed and efficiency of their collections methods. No more guessing if someone has received an invoice or trusting that it will be paid on time. This is a fully integrated solution that pays for itself over and over each month by preventing defaults and preserving client relationships.

HappyAR is an ever-evolving toolkit that helps optimize your invoice collections process and our solution starts at $0/month and scales up based on your invoice volume. Visit us at www.happyar.com to learn more.