ARM Industry Hit Last Quarter, But Still Optimistic

In preliminary results of insideARM’s Quarterly Confidence Survey for the third quarter of this year, more businesses in the accounts receivable management industry are reporting flagging results, but see solid performance in the quarters ahead.

The survey, designed to take the economic pulse of the ARM industry every quarter, is still open for those that wish to take it. It should take less than 3 minutes and all responses are confidential. We will continue to collect and analyze data, and we anticipate releasing the full survey results next month.

So far, survey participants have expressed a weaker performance environment that in the second quarter’s survey. In the most recent results, 51.4 percent of respondents reported “Average” current performance, with about 30 percent reporting either “Strong” or “Excellent” business performance. Although the picture seems solid, it’s a drop-off from last quarter when more than 45 percent of respondents reported “Strong” or “Excellent” performance.

But looking forward, more survey participants expect better performance in six and 12 months.

Pragmatism is also on display in the survey, as more in the industry are expecting to modify collection strategies to fit the current environment: 48.6 percent so far have said they are “Very Likely” to change collection strategies and 45.9 percent are “Somewhat Likely.” This is a large jump over last quarter’s survey when 38.6 percent said they were “Very Likely” to change strategies and roughly the same answered “Somewhat Likely.”

This sentiment is echoed in the free response section of the survey, with one participant noting, “Economic drivers will force strategic and tactical changes in order to take a more aggressive approach in accepting PPA. We can anticipate smaller average payment size and will need to offset with more volume. Leveraging analytics will be even more critical so that we can zero in on the potential payers.”

Another survey taker also had thoughts on new collection channels: “I expect the collateral recovery and bankruptcy aspect of my business to greatly increase.”

This quarter, we’ve thrown in a timely question about the impact of the coming Presidential election. As always, the ARM shows its pragmatism as the vast majority of respondents feel the election will have no effect, a minor effect, or a neutral impact on the industry.

If you haven’t taken the survey, please join the hundreds in the industry that have and take a couple of minutes to fill it out.