Getting Started

There's a wide range of ways to place an account, and clients use whichever fits how they work. Some send a placement template or form. Others export a spreadsheet or an aging report out of their own system. Most place by email with at minimum the invoice attached, often along with whatever supporting documentation is on hand.

JSD also takes placements by FTP or by fax, for clients whose systems call for it.

JSD takes the documents as they come and handles the data entry on our end. A client running a twenty-year-old ERP should not have to build an export routine to hand off a receivable.

Whatever documentation you send, which piece ends up mattering most depends on the dispute in front of the collector rather than a fixed order. A delivery confirmation settles one argument, a signed contract settles another. Sending it with the placement also cuts down on the requests we have to make later.

Four things open a file:

• The business name
• The address
• The amount owed
• The invoice date

Most clients also provide an internal identifier, whether that's an invoice number, contract number, customer number, or account ID. Contact details help as well, though JSD's research can usually track down a phone number or email where you don't have one. The four required fields are the ones only you can supply.

If you place using a column-based export, this is the structure JSD works from:

Scroll sideways to see the rest of the table.

There's no hard minimum balance. JSD will work any amount, though accounts under $200 are generally a poor fit for contingency collection, and it's worth checking with your account representative before placing very small balances.

There's no fixed age cutoff either. How old an invoice can be and still be collectible depends on the statute of limitations in the debtor's state, which varies. An older invoice is still worth sending, and JSD will tell you if a particular account falls outside what the law allows.

Five files or more route through the same OCR system used for bulk intake, so handling speed holds regardless of batch size.

JSD can take anything from a handful of accounts to batches running into the thousands without requiring the client to rebuild the placement into a proprietary format. For a closer look at how that intake pipeline handles FTP batches, AR aging exports, and scanned invoices at volume, see how we handle high-volume placement intake.

JSD works international accounts in-house, with no real limit on where a placement can be. Placements outside the US go to the same collectors under the same fee agreement, with translation support brought in when a debtor's correspondence calls for it.

Currency on a foreign recovery is arranged case by case. Most US agencies broker foreign placements to a correspondent agency or an attorney network abroad, which splits the fee and puts a second company between you and your account.

Confirmations run daily. A confirmation covers every account placed for you in that period and reaches you the following day, listing everything received. Each account shows a debtor ID and account number, the debtor name, your customer reference, the principal amount, the contingent fee rate, and the date assigned.

Every placement and confirmation is manually reviewed by JSD's admin team before the confirmation goes out. The account information is checked against what the client submitted rather than being passed through automatically.

Review the confirmation when it arrives and flag anything that does not look right. Catching a mistyped balance or a wrong reference at this stage lets JSD correct the account before it causes problems later.

The confirmation shows principal only. It does not include the contingent fee, other fees, or taxes, so the total on the sheet is not the total exposure on the account.

There is not always a separate onboarding period before collection begins. Once a client has agreed to the collection rate and JSD has the information needed to open the file, an account can go straight into placement. In some cases, a client can provide the required account information by phone and collection can begin from there.

Some new clients prefer to spend more time reviewing or establishing their agreement before placing accounts. JSD works to understand the business behind every placement and passes that context to the collector. Some businesses need more of it than others, depending on how their contracts and billing are structured.

Every file is verified before a collector works it. The admin team confirms the business is who the invoice says it is, generally by calling the number on file, and gathers whatever additional information may help the collector work the account.

A collector is assigned before the first contact goes out, so the person who reaches your debtor is the one who keeps the account through resolution. Outreach uses whatever channel finds the debtor: phone calls, letters, email, text, and online contact forms.

Every file keeps a documented record as the account is worked. Invoices and supporting documents you send are saved, key correspondence is retained, and each action a collector takes gets logged. If a question comes up later, whether from you or from a dispute, there's a record to work from rather than someone's memory of a call.

First contact typically happens within 24 to 48 hours on a single-account placement. A batch running into the thousands takes about a week to load and queue before outreach begins, since each file goes through verification first.

Funds JSD collects are held in a trust account and remitted to you on a set schedule. The remittance schedule, contingent fee mechanics, direct-payment handling, and the documents that come with each transfer are covered in Payments and Remittances.

If a debtor pays you directly, let your account representative know the amount and which invoice it applies to so collection activity on that balance can stop.