Stop Whining and Start Collecting

Published June 16, 2015

“Woe is me” is not an attitude worthy of any lawyer when it comes to collections issues. If clients aren’t paying their bills, lawyers need to stop whining and start evaluating—their own behavior.

First step to getting paid: Stop blaming the clients. True, the clients are the ones not paying bills for work completed in good faith. But law firms are not the victims of their delinquent clients. Rather, law firms are the victims of their own poor collections policies. You and the firm itself cause your collection problems by not telling clients from the beginning what you expect from them. Thus, you and your firm are the only ones who can solve your collection problems.

Firms fall into collection problems for a variety of reasons. Often an overriding fear is the loss of business. For this reason, partners accept work for clients who are unsuitable. Another reason for collection problems is that the firm has no written collections policy; thus, each partner handles the collections differently. Firms can cause themselves collection problems because they refuse to use outside collection agencies to help them collect on their overdue accounts. All of these factors can lead to collections disasters.

Think of it this way: If you do not create a collections policy, your customers will, in essence do it for you—but it may be a collections policy that is not to your liking. In other words, if you have trouble collecting your billings, your clients have created your collections policy—a lax one. And their version of your collections policy will not contribute significantly to your bottom line or cash flow.

You need to create a collections policy and stick to it. Only you and the lawyers in your firm can stem the flow of bad debts and overdue accounts.

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Audience type: Administrators, Associates, Large Law Firms, Small Law Firms, Sole Practitioners