Adam Parks (00:06)
Hello everybody, Adam Parks here with another episode of Receivables Podcast. Today I’m here with my new friend Will, joining me from Convoke to do a little bit of a mid-year pulse check of the industry. We made some predictions at the end of 2025, and it seems that a lot of those things are starting to come true. And now we’re starting to see the ripple effects across litigation networks. We’re seeing impact in terms of volume liquidation, and what a great time to be having that discussion.
So I think Will’s perspective and Convoke’s perspective coming at this, working for so many different creditors and having access to all that information, really puts them in a unique perspective to help share some insights on the direction of the industry. So, Will, thank you so much for joining me today. I really appreciate you coming on and sharing your insights.
Will (00:58)
Thanks, Adam. Pleasure to be here.
Adam Parks (00:59)
And for anyone who has not been as lucky as me, could you tell everyone a little about yourself and how did you get it to the seat that you’re today?
Will (01:06)
Sure. So I’ve spent over 20 years now in data software financial services. And so the journey there was I was at a startup for about a decade that grew over that time. That startup was acquired by Mastercard. So then spent a number of years at Mastercard, still focused primarily on the data analytics and software space.
And then one of my former colleagues from earlier in my career ended up introducing me and getting me connected to Dave and the Convoke team. The funny part of that story is that 17 years that I was in that space, I was actually in the same building as Convoke. I did not realize that, so I got connected in to Dave, realized we were about four floors away, and the rest has been history since then.
Adam Parks (01:55)
That is a great story. I love that. No two people have ever entered this industry exactly the same way. It’s always the most interesting part of the story for me. Well, now you’re there over at Convoke. Tell me a little about your role at Convoke and what the organization does.
Will (02:00)
Sure. So my role is focused on our go-to-market function. So leading sales and marketing for Convoke. Convoke is a software company. We build a recovery management system serving large banks, regional banks, fintechs, credit unions, and we are focused on all channels. So debt sales, agency, legal, supporting everything happening with third parties, the data exchange around that.
But also collecting financial data, providing analytics around that. So really a full end-to-end recovery management suite for credit issuers.
Adam Parks (02:46)
Fantastic. And for those that want to learn a little bit more about the organization and its origins, I did film an episode with David last year that he kind of gave us his background, which was really interesting. So we’ll link that below as well for the audience to go check it out. But for today’s topic, we had this vision in the survey last year for the TransUnion survey, where we saw an expectation in the increase of accounts and a decrease in the liquidation capabilities of those same accounts. So as usual, we’re being forced to do more with less.
And at the same time, we’ve got a regulatory environment that has not been as favorable as one might expect, given the current situation at the CFPB, but that has emboldened and empowered the states to start creating this patchwork.
As a software provider for creditors, I could imagine that all of those are your problem, organizing the way that that is going to be managed. So starting on the volume side of things, right, that that inverse relationship between volume of accounts and liquidation is a challenge in every economic cycle that we face. What are you seeing in 2026 from that perspective?
Will (03:58)
It is a interesting and challenging environment. So we are seeing that increase in delinquencies, increase in charge off coming through. Just for context, we stood across about 65 million loans in the US, so have a pretty good cross-section of data that comes in. So yeah, the delinquencies charge offs are rising, but it has gotten more challenging to collect on that. So there’s about a 1% annual decline in the recovery rate that’s being observed out there.
And that’s been going for probably a couple of years now, where it’s just getting more and more challenging. Like you said, doing more with less. As you see year over year, a 1% decrease in recovery rates. It’s really, really challenging issuers to think about their strategy, their approach, from what channels they’re using, what tools and technology they’re using, how can they really innovate with that backdrop.
Adam Parks (04:48)
The movement of documentation and other pieces of the puzzle for your team has been an integral part. Now that we’re seeing that kind of move towards litigation over other recovery channels, are you finding yourself with a strategic advantage in your ability to move that documentation? And have you seen a continued evolution of of that documentation itself and what is required?
Because from a jurisdictional basis, I know it’s especially as we think about the states, it has become more complex and it’s not just the states, sometimes it’s those individual judges as well. So how are you addressing that series of issues that are being faced by both the creditor and the law firm? ‘Cause you kinda sit as that communication mechanism in between.
Will (05:32)
Yeah, so in general, there’s been a push towards more legal and more using legal as a channel. So with that backdrop of it’s getting harder to recover, how do you account for that? Legal is one strategy because the recovery rates can be higher if it’s done well. So there is the challenge of all the documentation you need to manage both the performance and the compliance of those law firms.
So there’s hundreds of data fields and documents that have to get captured from demand letters, suit, judgment. garnishment, bankruptcy, you know, post-judgment remedies. There’s a lot of data that has to get incorporated. So that’s part of what we help with and you know standardize and capture that data.
But I would say more are using legal. Many are standing up a legal channel for the first time and deciding, do we go with building our own network? Do we find a network that’s out there, trying to manage that process? And then also pursuing legal for a broader variety of counts than we’ve seen in the past.
So in the past where that might be really high balance accounts, it’s it’s pushing broader where you’re going to much lower balances, still going to legal than we might have seen in the past.
Adam Parks (06:41)
And how do you offset that with the cost of the courts, right? And I think that’s been one of those those challenges. But has there been any operational changes that that give us better visibility to to reach deeper into the litigation channel or to bring more accounts down that channel? Or what has that kind of traffic controller looked like to manage that process?
Will (07:04)
The legal costs get very complicated very quickly. So I think the-, and expensive. So a lot of the approach there is how do you build a process around that? How do you get the cost data, categorize it appropriately, and then to manage that cost, how can you effectively tag what is recoverable versus non-recoverable? Because part of it is if if you’re correctly saying, okay, these are my recoverable costs, I can add these to a balance upon a judgment, you can recoup a lot of that costs.
Adam Parks (07:08)
Yeah, inexpensive.
Will (07:33)
But that takes the right process and infrastructure to correctly tag those. Like you said, jurisdictions are all different. You got state, county variation. They all treat the cost differently. So you need to be able to manage that complexity to manage the cost side of the equation and get your arms around that.
Adam Parks (07:50)
And how much of how how much of that localized knowledge becomes systematic through the processes? And how much of that is the individual, what’s called local attorneys that know John Doe is gonna require a green slip on a a repossession and you know, and the next one is not? Like where does that how do you track store and kind of manage that level of knowledge?
Will (08:14)
I would say the local law firms are still the experts on the different types of costs and how they can be treated. They they know that best and it evolves all the time. So really they’re going to be the ones to provide that as the input. Then it’s a matter of how you catch that data and categorize it and build the rules engine around it. So that’s where you need more of the systematic processes to take that and then you know prosecute that correctly. But the law firms, I think, are still the the experts on the ground with it.
Adam Parks (08:42)
So the system still needs to be flexible enough to be able to manage all of these different scenarios, but not necessarily the engine for retaining that knowledge, which makes sense because that that doesn’t remain consistent and constant indefinitely, right? Like there there’s no way for you to manage that level of change systematically. It requires somebody having been in court alerting you to that situation, but the flexibility and being able to manage the process.
Have you seen creditors take?- I mean, you, so we were talking about folks that were starting their litigation networks from the ground up or looking for an established network to kind of manage the accounts for them.
Have you seen a preference lately between those two avenues or more creditors moving down that let me find a network and an established tool set path? And is there any kind of a delineation between what types of creditors are selecting which path?
Will (09:37)
I would say most who are standing it up for the first time will go with a network. You know, there’s there’s plenty of complexity with legal. So, you know, there’s still a lot to manage even with a network. So that that that tends to be the most common. It’s typically large issuers that will manage their own or might switch from a network to managing their own as they’ve built up their scale and sophistication. But a lot of the time it starts with a network. We do see more you know, champion challenger with networks.
So in the past where it might be more one network that somebody selects, somebody might start with two or even three and then allocate accounts and see how performance is for their types of accounts. Because for different issuer, different types of accounts, different networks might perform better. So that’s become much more common as well.
Adam Parks (10:15)
That’s interesting. And and the challenges of building it, are we seeing more from a pre-litigation effort standpoint directly from the firms, or are you still seeing the management bifurcated between, okay, we’re gonna run this agency strategy for these accounts and then litigation may fall into that waterfall? Or like how how has that looked over the past year?
Will (10:42)
I’d say once an account is flagged, it’s typically litigation from the beginning, if it meets certain criteria or thresholds versus, you know, placing it first and then moving it to legal. So that has become more common. Again, partially this is the compression in recovery rates, making it so the sooner you get it to legal, the better the outcome will end up being. And it does, as we know, take time to go through legal also. So it tends to, yeah, for the accounts that meet the rules or thresholds go to legal initially.
Adam Parks (10:48)
Do you think those thresholds have been moved over time based on the changes in statutes of limitation? When we have a state that shortens our statute of limitation, you know, I’m I’m kind of of the opinion that it forces us to move towards that litigation channel faster because we need to get a judgment in order to maintain our right to collect the money that’s owed to us right for a longer period of time and hoping that there’s gonna be a change. But do you are you seeing the same kind of thing? Do you guys view it the same way?
Will (11:38)
We do, yeah. That’s an important data point to capture is what is the statute of limitations and where are you relative to that. And that does, I think create more going to legal and tracking, all right, if we’re within some time window, we need to make sure it gets to legal fast enough, like you said, to move through that process. So we do observe that happening.
Adam Parks (11:57)
And for those small creditors that are watching that have not started building those channels yet, but they’re starting to feel the economic pressure of needing a more sophisticated collection methodology for their financial institution, what advice do you have for them going into the second half of 2026? And please don’t say AI. Please, please, please please don’t just say AI.
Will (12:19)
I’m sure we’ll get through AI. But no, this is actually less of an AI question. yeah, I I do think you know, using a network is gonna be smart. It’s it’s a challenging thing to do. And using a network or or a few networks, as I mentioned, is gonna be a smart strategy. And then preparing for the documents and the data you’re gonna have to get back.
So having an approach and a plan to how do you know where they are in the process? How do you understand where you are? Moving through SLAs from demand letter to suit to judgment, how do you get copies of all the documents that are getting created? So planning for that side of it of, you know, you need to have a network, but you need to be ready to capture all the data coming back from the network as well and make sure you have a plan in place for that.
Adam Parks (13:04)
A level of compliance that runs over that. Talk to us about what that compliance layer starts to look like when you’re launching a new network. I mean it’s gotta be complex.
Will (13:15)
Yes, there’s a lot. So, you know, if you’re using agencies today, you know, you you’re not required to send media. You might have a debt validation request, but you’re not required to have media for every account for legal you are. So you need a mechanism to get all the media required, all the statements, the Ts and C’s, get that downstream to your law firms.
Then you need to be able to evidence as they’re going through their legal process, you need to be able to get the documents within a certain window from a compliance standpoint. So if they said they got a judgment, you need to get a copy of that judgment and the PDF of that judgment. So you need to be prepared from that standpoint. So there are a lot of those compliance nuances that come into play with legal.
Adam Parks (13:45)
So if they said they got a judgment, you need to get a copy of that judgment and PDF. And those loan management systems that banks and creditors are using to originate accounts are generally not going to solve those problems, right? They’re built to, they’re they’re built to bring new customers to the table. They’re built to underwrite, they’re built to service those loans. They’re not built to collect after the fact.
And so I’m assuming that’s where you guys come in and kind of become that data repository because you can’t, well, you can’t fix a hammer problem with a wrench. And I feel like too many organizations are trying to do too many things with a system that it’s not built to do and they end up doing it through add-on. So talk to me a little about what that differentiation looks like for a creditor who is expanding beyond their loan management system to actually manage collections and what kind of impact that can have on their business.
Will (14:26)
Right. Yeah, in our history, we found there’s, you know, two primary challenges that come up as you’re starting to use these channels that are not easily addressed by a loan management system. One is typically the media and getting that downstream. so how are you gonna get all those documents in an effective way to all of your law firms? And so that’s one challenge that’s out there that’s not always easily handled by current systems. The other that can be tricky is how do you capture data back upstream?
How do you get all the data around the legal milestones? How do you get all the third-party media back, when it’s coming from multiple sources. And if you’re using multiple law firms or multiple legal networks, they have different systems, processes, databases, naming conventions. So that’s the other challenge you have to plan for is how do you get that back upstream?
And so that’s you know, core focus of what of what we do. But as you’re thinking about your current technology, and what you would need to solve for to enable something like legal, those are the two key points that we find can be challenging.
Adam Parks (15:45)
I mean, I think that makes sense. The I I would think it’s also the tracking of those things. So you know the I mean the movement of the data is mission critical. You gotta be able to get a copy of the judgment back, but knowing that because this status triggered, now I need to be looking for that judgment in the first place, I think is one of those automations that allows the technology to to pick up some of the workload and carry it forward instead of having an army of people that are physically chasing these things the way that we did back in the day, right?
With a telephone and a fax machine, if we want to go far enough back. so seeing kind of how that has evolved and changed, what changes do you see on the horizon over the next 24 months? Do you think that we continue down this path? Do you think that there will be a shift at some point? Like, how do you see the next two years playing out based on what you’re seeing today.
Will (16:42)
I think there will be more, I won’t quite say AI, Adam, but I will say more analytics. I think there will be more analytics brought to bear to support that process. Because like you said, it’s been really hard for people to wrap their arms around are my accounts moving effectively through my legal stream? Because you have so many legal milestones, and then every state’s gonna be different. So it’s not like you can just have one SLA.
California is going to be very different to operate in than Florida. So you have to have different SLAs by state. And then you have to flag where are accounts getting stuck in the process. And that’s something that a credit issuer needs to know, but they need to also surface that information to the law firms because they’re the ones who ultimately have to take action on it.
So I think that’s where there’s gonna be a lot more built around how do you analyze that data? How do you surface it in a simple, easy, intuitive way to say, hey, here’s what you need to focus on, here’s what’s getting stuck, maybe you got a judgment and then nothing happened after. law firms can sometimes be really good at getting to judgment, but then the collecting money part after may not always be kind of the core focus. So how do you surface that insight and then make sure actions happening?
So I think there’s gonna be a lot more, you know, putting you know, data intelligence, analytics, dashboards that sit on top of that data to effectively manage the channel. Because the whole premise is yes, you can get to higher recovery rates, but that comes with making sure it’s effectively run and managed and all the accounts are moving through as they should be through the process.
Adam Parks (18:15)
And so as we look at all of the, if we as we look at that workflow of accounts that are coming to a litigation standpoint, when we get post-judgment, post-judgment execution is where a lot of firms fail. But successful post-judgment execution generally relies on injection of new data or triggers of life changes, right? Like there’s a process to identifying that it’s time to actively go and execute that. What is that process, how has that changed and how do you expect it to continue to evolve?
Will (18:44)
I think the first part of it is going to be a lot more data that gets captured on those post-judgment activities and remedies. So for example, capturing the data on garnishment so that you know these are accounts that post-judgment were subject to garnishment, and then ensuring did that happen and have those payments come through on a standardized basis.
So you have to capture both the post-judgment remedies but also the associated payment data, link that together and ensure what was expected to happen is is happening from a post-judgment standpoint. So I think the first step is getting more of that data in where it might have been hard to know what was happening before.
You just you may not have had visibility that might have just been with the law firm, but credit issuers weren’t capturing and mirroring that data back. So that’s step one is getting that data. And then step two is building, you know, the insights and analytics on top of it to flag, hey, here’s where an action needs to get taken.
Adam Parks (19:41)
Well, even beyond the process, do you think that there’s going to be a a stronger injection or organization of, let’s say, employment data? Right? We’re gonna in order for us to execute a garnishment, we gotta go find them. And somebody has to go find them. Is it the creditor who’s responsible for it under this SLA? Is it gonna be the is it gonna be the law firm themselves or is it gonna be somebody in between and who’s most likely to prioritize it? But have you seen any shift in the responsibility of the injection of that new data?
Will (20:12)
I wouldn’t say I’ve seen a big shift yet. I think a lot of that is still with the law firms themselves capturing that data. I I can see that evolving over time though, as you think about other third-party data sets, LexisNexis data, for example, you know, more, more Bureau data. Can you inject other data that would help with that process? And like you said, who’s responsible for that? And can you provide that to both the third party, both the law firm but also the credit issuer, so they both have visibility to that data. I think that’s something where more of that’s going to come. I I wouldn’t say we’ve seen a ton of that yet, but I do think that’s an opportunity that we’ll see more of.
Adam Parks (20:51)
I think the law firms are gonna have less data science resources than let’s say the creditor or an intermediary. And when they don’t have those resources, being able to do that at scale. And one of the major use cases of artificial intelligence that we’ve identified for the debt collection industry is organizing, you know, collecting and appending data to our data sets in order to activate that information.
So I wonder, in my mind, if that’s gonna start to shift just based on the availability of data science resources between these small and you know local and regional law firms as compared to the big bank that has it. But then the question comes down to whether or not the big bank is ever going to actually prioritize the debt collection strategy to that level to where it can get some of that data science time because isn’t it better spent finding new customers, originating more loans, right? Balancing their servicing and having things not fall out the other side.
So I don’t have an answer for it or any special visibility, but my experience tells me that it is likely to start to unfold over time, or we’ll see other vendors start to pop up that manage that injection of new data process.
Will (22:06)
Yeah. Yeah, I think it’s a great point and a great opportunity that’s out there. And I think that same opportunity exists in the agency space in a bit of a different way. So part of the response to the increased pressure on recovery rates is this shift to legal. Part of it is can you just get smarter about how you’re using your agency channel? Can you bring in more data science? Can you allocate market share more dynamically versus maybe today it’s a once a quarter?
You look at a basic dashboard, somebody goes up 5%, someone goes down 5%. You know, can you more dynamically do that? Or can you bring in data science to actually route an account to the agency that you predict will do best for that particular kind of account?
So that’s the other side of it where we do see more questions coming from credit issuers of yeah, part of it’s moving more towards legal, but part of it is can we just do better in agency by being smarter and bringing in more of this data science with the challenge being how do you get the resources? How do you get the funding and prioritization for it?
Adam Parks (23:08)
Been reading a lot of economic studies related to the impact of artificial intelligence in the call center and financial services spaces. There aren’t a lot of studies specific to the United States at this point, but the National Bureau of Economic Research released a piece on a Chinese sample, which demonstrated that that exact mechanism, that ability to determine which account should go to which organization based on strategy and even which channel at which time.
That piece of the puzzle seems to be the largest differentiator or the largest impact as it comes to the debt collection industry use cases. It’s that workflow automation, workflow optimization, and sending that right account to that right channel. And that seems to be the largest impact. But it was a Stanford study that told us that there’s a high-performing AI organizations are 400% more likely to have reworked their processes from the ground up.
Leveraging the artificial intelligence solutions as compared to those organizations that just bolt on a piece of AI to existing processes. And so I’m not sure what that is going to start to look like, but it sounds like the flow of data is going to allow us some new and interesting opportunities.
Can we house that data in a single location that allows us to crawl it, to better understand it, to understand the correlations and patterns that are coming up? And that’s where I think there’s some real opportunity for us as an industry to be able to do more with less, right? We’ve got more accounts, we’ve got less liquidation. How are we going to do it? I think those are some of those options that we’re really going to find.
And you know, you you go to a conference and all you hear about is the voice AI bots. And I think that’s the the sexy thing that’s out there right now, but I don’t think that that’s the be all end all solution here. Cause without the me- without the workflow management mechanism, are you putting the right call with the right person? Because my gut would tell me that older folks are more likely to to want to talk to a person and younger folks are more likely to talk to the AI. But in that National Bureau of Economic Research study, it was the exact opposite.
Because the older population just required a notification, they just needed a reminder that this bill was due, whereas the younger generation actually required some coaxing and some engagement. And so I I think that we’re gonna learn more about our populations in counterintuitive ways and being in a position to get the data into one location at one time, crawl it, understand it, look for those correlations, I think is that first major step in the right direction.
Towards us finding out who we are and really how our consumers behave. And the more that we can look at that behavioral intelligence and determine next action based on their last action is gonna be far more predictive than anything that we can do with raw data sets. I mean, you gotta have the right phone number to call somebody. So there’s, you know, that piece of it.
But their behavioral signals I feel like are gonna be a much stronger indicator of next action than anything that we could just buy from off the shelf.
Will (26:15)
Yeah. Yeah, I would agree a 100%. I hear the same focus that you do, where it’s a lot about where can we take cost out? Can we have AI agents? Can we reduce, you know, cost in our call center? Like that that’s what you hear a lot about. But I agree that the bigger opportunity is how do you use this technology to drive revenue? How do you actually use it to get higher recovery rates, to be smarter about how you allocate accounts or channel preference for a consumer?
I agree that’s the bigger opportunity that we see as well from an AI standpoint. And then how do you set that up? How do you, like you said, curate that data, build that environment and rebuild your processes to have more of a AI driven approach that can drive from a revenue standpoint, not just where where can I take out cost?
Adam Parks (27:01)
I think that’s what our future looks like because cost savings is great and I know controlling costs is the second highest concern of debt collection organizations and I completely respect that, but I don’t think that that’s the benefit that we’re going to find from artificial intelligence. And I realize that the cost of tokens are going down quickly, but as the tools improve and their capabilities improve, the cost of running some of these AI tools has increased exponentially. The more I’ve experimented in the last sixty days, my bill has gone up like a 1000%.
But I’ve been able to build some really interesting tools. I’ve been able to learn a lot. So it’s been, you know, part of the education. But maybe that’s where maybe that’s what happens with student loans in the future as we’re just buying tokens. But that’s another it’s another joke for another day.
Well, I really do appreciate you coming on and sharing your insights with me here today. It sounds like you guys are still working on so many different great things over there at Convoke and your perspective working across so many different creditors and different styles of organizations, types of debt really gives you some great perspectives to share. So I do appreciate it.
Will (28:07)
Yeah, it’s my pleasure. Thanks for having me on.
Adam Parks (28:10)
Absolutely. For those of you who are watching, if you have additional questions you’d like to ask Will or myself, you can leave those in the comments on LinkedIn and YouTube and we’ll be responding to those. Or if you have additional topics you’d like to see us discuss, you can leave those in the comments below as well. And hopefully I can get Will back here at least one more time to help me continue to create great content for a great industry. But until next time, everybody, Will, thank you so much. I really do appreciate you. And thank you everybody for your time and attention. We’ll see you all again soon. Bye, everyone.
