How to Write a Deposition Ready Collection Email

Working in accounts receivable can cause daily frustrations. If a customer repeatedly ignores your attempts to collect, you risk losing out on valuable cash flow. Sometimes this frustration can show in the emails we send to customers. Although it may seem harmless to get a little angry with a customer when they aren't complying to pay, it does more than reak havoc on your own personal guilt. An angry email can effect the company and its reputation if it one day winds up in a deposition

During a deposition, the opposition will do a discovery to find every written contract or record, including email. Thanks to the use of cloud storage, even deleted emails or ones sent months ago can be brought into the deposition. Any emails or text message sent to a customer can and will be used against your company.

In order to avoid nerve-wrecking situations like this and write a deposition ready collection email, take a look at our guide below.

• Take a Minute Before Sending
  Any time you feel angry or frustrated, save the email in a draft. Do not hit the send button until you have had time to walk away and think about it. This is a good rule of thumb, not just for frustrating customers, but for any email you may send. Usually you will come back and be thankful you never sent it. Before sending a deposition ready collection email, ask yourself this: Is anything in this email driven by my emotions? Is there anything in this email that could be misconstrued? Is this email necessary?
• Could This Be a Better Phone Call?
  Although email always feels more convienent because you don't have to actually pick up a phone and talk to anyone, it isn't always the best form of contact. Sometimes there is simply too much important information to convey over email and it's easier to schedule a phone call. If there is the possibly that a customer may misinterpret what you're saying, always pick up the phone. 
• Watch Your Language
  This may seem obvious, but you should never curse in an email to a customer. Often time if we are really frustrated we may send an email to a co-worker to blow off steam, but even those are fair game. Do you really want an email where you called a customer an "idiot" to end up in a deposition? What you say can end up as public record.
• Watch Out for Unintentional New Contracts
  It has happened to most of us in the accounts receivable profession: a customer missed their payment date so you give them an extension or change their payment terms for this one occassion. However, Karen L. Hart, a litigation partner at Bell Nunnally & Martin LLP., warns in NACM's Business Credit magazine that courts have upheld email exhanges as a contract modification. Even a signature block has been recognized in some courts as a sufficient contract signature. As long as there is an offer, acceptance and consideration, you may be entering into a new contract without even noticing. 
• Use Email Templates
  A great way to have deposition ready collection emails is to simply use email templates. If you have an accounts receivable automation application that can auto-send emails, you can pre-create collection letters, payment reminders, notices of legal actions and more. By pre-creating these emails, you never risk allowing your emotions to get ahead of you. They can be preapproved by a lawyer or credit manager to ensure that you are always sending deposition ready collection emails. 

Email can give us a false sense of security due to its laid back nature, however, they should be taken seriously and should always be written with the idea that it could one day end up in a deposition. As mentioned above, using automated accounts receivable software can mitigate some of these risks. Emails can automatically be sent out to customers past a certain due date using pre-created email templates, eliminating the possibility of sending emails in frustration. This way, every email is a depostion ready collection email.