UK Entrepreneurs Launch Low-Cost Legal Debt Recovery Platform

Having launched a highly profitable software development house, BACK Consulting have launched a revolutionary new company which is set to change the way that SME’s and large corporations across the UK and Ireland manage their debts and solve their legal problems. Co-Directors Andrew Charlton and Barry Kemp have created BACK inContact

Limited a Tyneside based organisation which has one simple aim, to reduce cost of legal services to the business community. With over 25 years experience in the industry between them, they bring a wealth of knowledge to the sector along with their key legal partners.

Back inContact has secured substantial investment and has built a network of law firms in England, Scotland and Ireland as well as a highly talented pool of technical experts and a 225 seat call centre, which is set to expand to around 550 seats by the end of 2007.

With law firm partners in Glasgow, Tyneside and Dublin BACK inContact have pulled together progressive partners and smart technology to create a simple and effective platform to deliver help to businesses of all sizes.

LOW COST MODEL
BACK Director Barry Kemp commented “There is a place in the business community for legal services to be provided on a commodity basis, a fixed price for a clear instruction without frills, something akin to the low cost airline model.

We keep the costs down and pass on the benefit of this to our clients. We see that with coming reforms in the legal sector the dominance of high profile large expensive law firms will be challenged by more flexible and responsive companies. We’re already seeing the likes of Tesco and Halifax moving into this space to provide commodity non contentious work”.

Andrew Charlton explained “For too long main stream law firms have been charging clients premium rates for providing very simple low cost services like debt recovery, conveyancing and wills. Clients are paying the price for law firms who have expensive locations with high overheads. When all said and done, clients want value for money and effective solutions to their day to day problems, like collecting debts, and our service helps them get exactly that, at prices most law firms would find incomprehensible.”

“Some major bulk buyers of legal services can drive keen prices in the commodity sector, however, we’re offering clear transparent low cost services to everyone.” Charlton added.

Barry Kemp said “Typical law firm charges for a simple letter of demand can vary from a few pounds to £40 across the UK. We offer our law firm collection letters free of charge in most cases for b2b debts and from as little as £2 for b2c debts. However, we go further than most of the competition in that we can offer a whole range of pre legal letters not just a final demand as well as pay per use inbound and outbound collection calls and shortly we’ll be adding payment handling and credit checks, all at a low per use cost compared to the market.”

Charlton went on to add “In debt recovery for example, most traditional law firms aim to help out their clients at a stage where legal proceedings are required, almost as a last resort. We know that solicitor’s letters are effective tools in helping credit managers and business owners get paid, so why not use them sooner in the collection process?”

“Rather than wait until a relationship with a non paying customer has gone permanently sour, we focus on pre-legal collections work and our aim is to rehabilitate an account whenever we can by resolving payment problems early and handing back the account to the client, helping our customers to keep theirs.”

“We do recognise however that legal action is needed at times which is why we have formed alliances across the UK and Ireland with leading law firms to provide the legal support for court action again at low cost to the client, concentrating on providing an end to end value for money service”.

“What has proved intriguing is the growing number of law firms and professional bodies who recognise the importance of these service areas but have a high cost base or no existing collections service who now approach us with a view using BACK inContact’s infrastructure to deliver a service to their clients under their brand name.”

Charlton added “We’re already working on further legal products and services for roll out in 2007 as well as a roll out into Central Europe and the Middle East providing more low cost services using the same business model.”