Debt collection comes to fintech

Australian debt collection just got the fintech treatment

Debt collection has come to fintech, and it's growing strong. 

InDebted is a Sydney-based startup bringing fintech to debt collection and their collection process is a lot tamer than in the movies. 

“We change a lot of the wording and tone and templates depending on who our client is,” says Josh Foreman, the founder of InDebted.

“We’re building solutions to adapt and completely rethink how we approach collection.”

InDebted are a 16-month-old company that, as their company name suggests, deals with debt. Running a digital platform built entirely in-house, the company is working to disrupt a centuries-old industry by bringing in fintech. 

“We engineer solutions with tech rather than more people. This has allowed us to scale.”

“[We’re] facilitating a lot of [our] communication through our platform. Over the next 12 months as we explore machine learning and collect more data we’ll do a more personalised collection at scale.”

The company has six full-time staff and recently completed a funding round which brought in more than $1 million. Investors included Reinventure, Westpac’s venture capital fund, and Lachlan Heussler, the CEO of Spotcap Australia. 

“Having the backing of such a high-quality pool of investors to bring in support is significant for us,” Mr Foreman says.

With the money raised, the company plans on building out its engineering team, helping it to scale further. 

Young even by startup standards, InDebted is already drawing in millions of dollars in collections from over 1000 customers. 

“We’re experiencing solid month-on-month growth… this will be our best month ever,” says Mr Foreman.  

Asked by AltFi where he sees debt collection going in the future, Mr Foreman says that tough economic times, which - on a long enough time scale - are inevitable, will sieve out the more and less efficient collectors.

“In difficult times, like credit crunches, when more people want to call in, the volume of debt collection and success rate will be what differentiate competitors.”