First Party Collections

USING DATA SCIENCE TO RECOVER REVENUE & RETAIN CUSTOMERS

  • Our first party team improves time efficiencies by allowing you to focus on your business core competencies without the time consumption of managing company cash flow.
  • Our first party team will manage your excess accounts receivable volume and surges to improve working capital.

WHY US

  • A fully trained first-party team with decades of experience to accelerate your cash flow, protect your brand and avoid potential financial losses.
  • A systematic approach to reduce your operational collection costs.

WE WILL

  • Provide professional representation with our IACC certified collection professionals.
  • Provide you with cash flow directly to your company and resolve debtor disputes quickly to create faster working capital.
  • Manage payment plans-reducing potential interruptions improving your collection gaps.

 

Call us Toll-Free 1-888-295-1799 and Speak to our First Party Representative for your customized quotation.

Third-Party Recovery

Analytics-Driven Performance with Iron Clad Compliance

  • Quick recovery of funds while protecting your brand
  • Use of innovative technology combined with experienced continuously trained collection agents that will produce higher liquidity on your placements compared to the industry norm.
  • We help clients improve their processes, reduce their third party spend while increasing cash flow and reducing total financial losses.
  • Independently audited to assure you of the highest financial standards as one of only 18 agencies nationally to achieve CLLA/IACC Certification.

Legal Forwarding

INCREASE RECOVERIES WHILE AVOIDING COURT COST AND LITIGATION FEES

After traditional collection efforts fail, attorney collection services can help generate recoveries. These services offered by The LaSource Group often enable you to avoid, or reduce dramatically, the time and expense of local litigators and court costs.

OUR FIDUCIARY RESPONSIBILITY TO OUR CLIENTS

If litigation is required, The LaSource Group uses a proven formula of success that includes a sound fiduciary responsibility to you our client with each case. At The LaSource Group, we realize that litigation can be costly and time-consuming. Each case has its own persona and our legal professionals perform detailed asset and liability searches prior to suit to determine the best course of action.

Over the years, we have built a network of collection attorneys that are knowledgeable and local to your debtor’s particular jurisdiction. We have the experience and knowledge to counsel our clients through the legal system quickly and efficiently to recover your money. Every legal file is bonded up to $3.5 million dollars for our client’s protection. These attorneys specialize in commercial collection law and adhere to the strict code of ethics set forth by the Commercial Law League of America. We advise our clients through every step of the legal process and provide timely updates for each case. Our history of working with the attorney networks allow for seamless communications on each case.

Bankruptcy Preference Defense Cases

The Bankruptcy Protector

When debtors file for bankruptcy, certain payments made in the days preceding the filing are subject to demands that the payments be turned over to a bankruptcy trustee or returned to the debtor (the “bankrupt”). These payments are referred to as “preferences.” Preference targets are creditors, such as trade creditors, who did business with a troubled company that ultimately files for bankruptcy. The primary purpose of this provision of the Bankruptcy Code is to promote and attempt to uphold the equality of the distribution of a debtor’s assets among its creditors. However, it often has the effect of “punishing” creditors who continued to do business with a financially distressed debtor by requiring them to pay back the money they received during the pre-bankruptcy preference period.

1. Elements of a Preferential Transfer

To claw back a preference payment, the debtor (or bankruptcy trustee) must establish the following:

  1. A transfer of an interest of the debtor in property (usually a payment);
  2. Made to or for the benefit of a creditor;
  3. For or on account of a debt owed by the debtor;
  4. Made while the debtor was insolvent;
  5. Within 90 days before the date the bankruptcy case was filed, or within 1 year for “insiders”; and
  6. That enables the creditor to receive more than it would have received in a Chapter 7 liquidation.

2. Timing

The “preference period” is 90 days before the bankruptcy filing for typical creditors and 1 year for “insiders.” Insiders are defined as relatives of the debtor, a general partner of the debtor, or if the debtor is a corporation, officers, directors, or a person in control of the company.

Under the Bankruptcy Code, a preference case normally must be commenced by the later of 2 years after the case is filed or 1 year after the appointment or election of the first trustee in the bankruptcy case.

3. Defenses

While it may seem like any creditor doing business with a troubled debtor will be forced to return funds received within 90 days of the bankruptcy, there are several available defenses under the Bankruptcy Code.

a. Substantially contemporaneous exchange 

If the payment or other transfer the creditor received from the debtor was intended by both parties to occur at the same time as the sale or transfer of something of new value to the debtor, the preferential payment may be completely exempted from turnover. New value is defined as money or monies worth in goods, services, new credit, or the release of property previously transferred, but it does not include substituting one obligation for another. There are no hard and fast rules as to how “contemporaneous” the exchange must be, but courts generally require that the transfer occur within 1 to 14 days of the transfer of new value to the debtor.

b. Payments made in the ordinary course 

This is possibly the most heavily litigated preference defense. In 2005, the ordinary course defense was modified to make it easier for creditors to establish ordinariness. A creditor will need to show that the transaction at issue was incurred in the ordinary course of business or financial affairs of the debtor – a factor often easily met. Additionally, a creditor will need to establish either (1) that the transfer was made in the ordinary course of business or financial affairs as between the debtor and creditor; or (2) that the transfer was ordinary in the business or trade in which the debtor is involved. Thus, a creditor can point to either its specific dealings with the debtor in the past or, if there is no established course of dealing between the parties, that the transfer is considered ordinary by industry standards.

c. Purchase money security interests 

This defense protects lenders that have loaned funds to a debtor to purchase a specific item, as long as there is a specific security agreement describing the property, the funds are used exclusively to purchase the item, the debtor does purchase said item, and the creditor perfects its security interest within 30 days of the debtor receiving the item.

d. New value 

This defense provides that a transfer may not be avoided to the extent that after the transfer, the creditor gave new value to the debtor on an unsecured basis. The policy underlying the new value defense is to encourage creditors to extend new credit to financially troubled companies by allowing the new credit to act as a defense to a subsequent preference lawsuit.

e. Floating liens or improvement in position 

A floating lien is a lien in a constantly changing pool of collateral (i.e., inventory, accounts receivable, crops). A holder of a perfected security interest in inventory or accounts receivable will not be avoided as a preference unless the creditor improves his position during the preference period. In determining whether the creditor has improved its position, courts consider the creditor’s position on the petition date as compared to its position 90 days before filing.

f. De minimis payments

The Bankruptcy Code excludes from preference liability transfers that are deemed too minimal. For debtors whose debts are not primarily consumer debts, a transfer may not be avoided if the aggregate value of the transfers is less than $6,425.00 (to be readjusted effective April 1, 2019). For debtors whose debts are primarily consumer debts, the de minimis limit is $600.00.

g. Standing

The Bankruptcy Code limits standing to pursue a preference action to (1) the debtor-in-possession; (2) the creditors committee, if the right to pursue preference actions has been assigned via court order; (3) the plan administrator or liquidating trustee in a Chapter 11; (4) the bankruptcy trustee; and (5) a purchaser at a sale of substantially all of debtor’s assets, provided the purchaser acquired the rights to the debtor’s preference actions.

h. Contact Our Attorney

Perhaps the most important thing to take away is that if you receive a preference demand letter, immediately contact your attorney. An experienced attorney can help to reduce the amount owed or eliminate any liability. A thorough knowledge of preference law, defenses, and procedures provide the foundation for using these preference defense strategies. Moreover, failure to pay attention to any lawsuit could result in a default judgment.

Contact Us for a Free Consultation

Bankruptcy Auto Alert™

Every Day 260 Businesses File for Bankruptcy

The LaSource Group is your early warning system. Call (888) 295-1799 Today.

BANKRUPTCY AUTO ALERT ™  SAVES OUR CLIENTS ON AVERAGE $5.2 MILLION ANNUALLY

Our unique Bankruptcy Auto Alert program can protect your entire commercial accounts receivable portfolio. No longer do you have to wait days or weeks from the courts to find out your customers have filed chapter 11 bankruptcy. Our clients have saved hundreds of thousands of dollars in stopped shipments and recovered goods in transit with our timely notifications.

Consulting Services

WE CAPTURE VALUE ACROSS BOUNDARIES AND BETWEEN THE SILOS OF ANY ORGANIZATION

Our management consulting services focus on our clients’ most critical issues and opportunities: strategy, marketing, organization, operations, transformation, and advanced analytics across all industries and geographies. We bring deep, functional expertise, but are known for our holistic perspective: we capture value across boundaries and between the silos of any organization. We have proven a multiplier effect from optimizing the sum of the parts, not just the individual pieces.