Many decades ago, one of my college professors said that anybody who actually wanted to become a police officer was inherently unqualified for the job.  His argument was that beating up on your fellow citizens was so heinous and disgusting that no sane, mentally-healthy American would want such a job.  As I had a relative who briefly held such a job – without remorse – I have also wondered if the same logic applied to debt collectors.

Mike Cardoza was a fellow Rotarian with me and nearby-neighbor.  He was also president of a debt collection company.  In his new book, The Secret World of Debt Collection, Mike paints a very different picture of debt collectors.  Only once does he remind us that debt collectors are also human beings, but that is a weapon against them.

The world of debt collection is just another business, with millions of computer lines of numbers.  Like any business, it wants to pick the “low-hanging fruit” of people who actually want to pay their debts.  Debt collectors have one huge advantage, i.e., the overwhelming majority of people feel a moral obligation to repay their debts.  Isn’t that silly?  Why do you have a moral obligation when you don’t have any legal obligation?

The biggest disadvantage for debt collectors is the numerous and sometimes conflicting laws on consumer lending and consumer protection.  They don’t want to fight cases that require too much time and attention.  So, Mike’s advice is to be nice to the annoying debt collectors but get them to write letters to you, and be sure to save every one of those letters.  When in doubt, stall them — sooner or later, they will violate some law, and there are many attorneys who love to sue financial institutions on a contingency-fee basis.

It is a short book, but I highly recommend it.  Mike has a certain missionary zeal to help debtors, and we should help him “spread the word!”