Retail Business - Aged Debt Recovery
Recovering Commercial Debts Through Expert Legal Escalation
Summary
A leading international manufacturer turned to Controlaccount after repeated attempts to recover a substantial overdue invoice had failed. Following pre-legal action and a solicitor’s letter, winding-up proceedings prompted full payment within seven business days, enabling the client to recover the debt and receive a refund of the Official Receiver’s deposit.
The Organisation
One of the world's largest jewellery manufacturers, supplying retailers globally through operations across the UK, Europe, North America, Asia and Australia.
Cases referred
100
Overseas accounts
The Challenge
The client's UK finance team was experiencing difficulties recovering overdue invoices from retailers based in the Republic of Ireland. While some accounts appeared likely to require legal action, the client was concerned about the cost, complexity and potential impact on valuable retailer relationships.
They required a recovery partner capable of delivering strong collection performance within Ireland while protecting their brand reputation and minimising unnecessary legal expenditure.
Success Rate to Date
66%
The difference made:
Controlaccount implemented a tailored Republic of Ireland recovery strategy, combining specialist local market knowledge with a proactive, multi-channel collections approach. Dedicated Irish contact channels, enhanced engagement workflows and euro-denominated payment facilities helped remove barriers to payment and encourage earlier customer engagement.
Our objective was to maximise recovery through pre-legal collections wherever possible, preserving commercial relationships and avoiding the costs associated with litigation. For the small number of accounts that could not be resolved through standard recovery activity, our Debt Assessment Process identified those most likely to achieve a successful legal outcome, ensuring litigation was only pursued where commercially appropriate.
The vast majority of referred accounts were recovered in full through pre-legal collections, with only a small number requiring structured repayment arrangements. For those cases progressed to litigation, Controlaccount achieved a 100% positive outcome.
The partnership enabled the client to improve cash flow, reduce internal administration and recover overdue debt while maintaining strong relationships with its retailer network.
Controlaccount also provided:
- Secure data transfer services
- Compeitive commission rates for overseas collections
- Fully managed legal services in Republic of Ireland
- Data cleansing and trace services
- Monthly and weekly reporting and analysis across individual accounts, debt type and overall performance
- Secure digital engagement through our ClientWeb and ControlMyAccount portals, providing full transparency, online payment, query management and self-service options
What they said
We had always avoided any third-party debt recovery as we worried about the impact on our reputation. In fact, it worked the other way; Controlaccount took the heat out of any conversations, worked with our customers to deliver firm but fair payment plans and probably protected our brand and retailer relationships more than we could dealing with it in-house. The whole process was straightforward and enabled our internal credit control teams to focus on the less painful recoveries and reminders. I strongly recommend any business that needs to recover in Ireland to speak with Controlaccount
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