Creditor Survey Underscores Anxiety about Current Economic Conditions

InsideARM’s recent Confidence Survey of credit grantors reveals both an unassuaged grasp of the struggling U.S. economy’s potential to impact negatively consumer payment patterns and, at the same time, the entrenched belief that their partners in the ARM industry will rally to improved performance over the next year.

Last month, insideARM launched a series of Confidence Surveys directed at creditors, collection agencies, and vendors that support receivables management. After analyzing the results from hundreds of respondents, the findings from the contingency collections market were published June 17 on insideARM. The data that follows here represents the combined perspectives of professionals in two creditor industries—financial services and healthcare—with particular emphasis on the healthcare arena. Please note that all statistics expressed within this report are drawn from survey participants who identified themselves as “creditors.” Later this week, Inside Card & Creditor Receivables will follow a parallel tack, but with banks and card issuers at the forefront of the analysis.

In elementary terms, the creditor survey validated what most Americans already know about the troubled U.S. economy. The confluence of a mortgage crisis, rising unemployment, and upticks in the price of gasoline and foodstuffs that appear to surge ever higher on a weekly, if not daily, basis is weighing heavily on consumers’ minds and pocketbooks. While economists and government financial regulators continue to engage in semantic disputes over the veracity of claims that the U.S. economy is in recession, regular Americans are acutely aware that eggs and milk cost more today than they did last fall, that ten dollars barely buys them two gallons of gas, and that companies large and small across the country are trimming their payrolls with the apparent aid of a dull machete.

A recent Washington Post article that breaks down the incongruity between consumers’ impressions of economic circumstances and the actual state of the economy argues that however great the disparity between “reality” and confirmable “fact” in relation to the current financial crisis, public perception hurriedly alters consumer behavior. For example, following the monthly announcement of negative employment figures, or in the wake of an especially dismal week for the stock exchanges, consumers are apt to declare that the sky is falling, even if they possess adequate job security and do not invest in the financial markets. Pessimistic sentiments about the country’s monetary compass are likely to constrain consumer spending, further exacerbating an already bleak situation. For credit grantors and the ARM industry, reductions in spending not only herald fewer new purchases, they also lead many households to keep a tight rein on all cash outlays. The end results of this behavior translate to higher rates of delinquency and drastically lower recovery rates for creditors and collection agencies, respectively.

In light of the fact that American consumers are fending off concurrent assaults on their household finances from multiple directions, an examination of how creditors assess the relative impact of broad economic forces on consumers, and ultimately on recovery rates, was warranted.