Second Edition Starting a Collection Agency, How to make money collecting money

List Price: $39.99 Discount Price: $31.95

Customer Reviews:

Good information [Posted on 2007-03-16]
Nicely laid out, easy to read and informative. Good book for beginning agencies.

Everything You Wanted To Know About Starting A Collection Agency And More [Posted on 2007-07-02]
There is a lot to like about Michelle Dunn's second edition of Starting A Collection Agency. First it is written by someone who really is an expert and knows her stuff. Although she had lots of credit manager experience, she had never worked in a collection agency when she decided to run one herself. Through trial and error and lots of hard work and study, she became successful and later sold the business so she could work full-time on her writing and consulting. She gives practical advice with lots of forms,letters, and checklists to use. In addition, she gives many websites and references for people in the field to contact. She has formed her own website for networking and discussions so that people new to the field can get information that took her years to collect. Her personality shines through and one can tell that she loves this kind of work. She is generous with her information and she really wants her readers to succeed. I highly recommend this book to people who want to start a collection agency. but it is also interesting to anyone who wants to know more about the collection process. I also loved the cover photo which consists of stacks of money.

Weak [Posted on 2007-10-25]
This book is supposed to combine two subjects: collecting and starting a small business. I was looking for more information about collecting and I suspect some viewers may be more interested in information about starting a small business.

The author's style is conversational, but maybe too much so; the book is riddled with errors that indicate that it was not professionally edited, but that alone isn't too bad. I actually like the folksy tone of the book, but the author confuses the issue by switching between being your friend and selling you other goods and services from her consultancy. Indeed, she is shameless about failing to cover a subject, instead referring you to her other works...at an additional fee. It is also very self-congratulatory without the substance to back it up, which is a real turn-off for me.

This book was not very helpful to me in learning more about collections; in fact, I have since read two other books that were less than half the price and many times superior to this one in that regard. If you don't know collections, get a collections book for much less money.

As an accountant and small business consultant, I can say that if you looking for more information about starting a small business this is not your book. It is very weak, and chapters are often one or two pages, sometimes merely listings of information (such as the respective secretaries of state) that a two-minute Google research stint could unearth. If you want to learn more about starting a small business, many books with real coverage of that topic could be had much cheaper.

All in all, this book was extremely weak on covering either topic. Its information should have been condensed into a single chapter for one of her other books, or else the information from the other books should have been included in this volume. You can imagine how badly I wish I had my forty dollars back.

Please Don't Waste Your Money [Posted on 2008-06-13]
I bought this book hoping to get some really good information about opening a collection agency and what I received was an incredibly simplified book. There's a chapter on "collection terms" like "pay" and "debt" etc. The font is at least 24 type and includes mostly general information that can be applied to any business. I hate trashing books, but I have to say that this was money wasted.

Very basic. [Posted on 2008-09-29]
I was hoping to find much more detail on how to start this business and more best practices. I went through the entire book in about 30 minutes and did not learn one thing. If you know how to start and run a small business and just want detailed specifics about debt collections this is not the book for you. It seems more about starting a business in general with just a hint of debt collection.

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