The payment reminder that collects before anyone picks up.
Most collections dialling spends its first ninety seconds on something a machine can do: confirming who answered, reading out a balance, and asking whether they intend to pay. This flow does that part, and only involves a person when the answer is interesting.
Collections and payments · 11 steps
A collections floor makes the same call thousands of times. An agent dials, waits, confirms identity, reads a figure off a screen, asks the question, and types the answer back in. The conversation that actually needed a human is the one in ten where somebody disputes the amount or needs to arrange terms.
The other nine are a script with a number in the middle. Running them through agents is how a floor ends up needing forty people to work a list that twelve could close.
Step by step, with the node each one uses.
- 01
Screen before anything else
Federal DNC CheckNothing is dialled until the registers have been checked. Put this first so a suppressed number never reaches the rest of the flow, rather than screening after the greeting.
- 02
Only call inside permitted hours
Business HoursEvaluated in your own timezone. Outside the window the call does not proceed, which is a rule you can evidence rather than a habit you rely on.
- 03
Confirm this is somebody you hold
If Existing LeadIf the number does not match a record, there is no balance to quote and the flow should not pretend otherwise.
- 04
Fetch the live balance
Trigger WebhookCalls your ledger with the contact id and captures what comes back into flow variables: the amount outstanding and the due date. Five second timeout, with a failure branch, because a ledger that is down should not produce a call that quotes nothing.
- 05
Say the amount out loud
Playback AudioSpoken through your Brand Voice Kit with the captured variables interpolated. The caller hears the real figure and the real date, not a generic message asking them to call back.
- 06
Ask the question that sorts the list
Route to IVRPaying today, arranging terms, or disputing. One keypress, three branches, and the branch is the only thing that decides whether this call needs a person.
- 07
Take the reference number
Capture DigitsOn the paying-today branch. The caller keys in the account or reference number from their statement and it lands in a variable you named.
- 08
Post the promise to pay
Trigger WebhookSends the captured reference and the amount to your payment provider or ledger. Whatever it returns is captured for the next step.
- 09
Branch on what the processor said
Match Webhook VariableAccepted, declined or unavailable are three different conversations. Only one of them needs an agent.
- 10
Record the outcome on the record
Update Lead StageThe stage moves without anybody typing. This is the step that stops the same person being called again on Thursday.
- 11
Hand over the ones that need a person
Route to TeamDisputes and arrangements go to the team that handles them, with the record already open and the balance already on screen.
The variables.
Captured mid-call and readable by every later node, including inside a spoken prompt and inside a webhook body.
${AMOUNT}Balance outstanding, captured from your ledger and spoken back${DUE_DATE}When it was due, used in the prompt${ACCOUNT_NO}What the caller keys in, posted to the processor${PAY_STATUS}What the processor returned, used to branchThe nine calls in ten that were only ever a script never reach an agent, and the one that matters arrives with the balance already confirmed and the intent already stated.
It is also the version of this call that survives an audit. Screening ran before dialling, the hours rule was enforced rather than remembered, and the outcome was written by the system that heard it.
- Never speak a card number back to the caller, and never put one in a prompt.
- Read the captured reference back before you act on it. One Playback node prevents a payment posted against the wrong account.
- Give the ledger webhook a failure branch. A flow that quotes a balance it did not receive is worse than one that apologises and routes to a person.
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