Credit Controller Job Description, Skills, and Salary
Get to know about the duties, responsibilities, qualifications, and skills requirements of a credit controller. Feel free to use our credit controller job description template to produce your own. We also provide you with information about the salary you can earn as a credit controller.
Who is a Credit Controller?
Credit control is a method used by an organization or firm, including central banks, to manage credit to prequalified customers who can pay on time. This is a critical task as it will affect the entire society if credit is not issued in a coordinated and appropriate manner.
A healthy cash flow is possible only if credit management is in place. Credit controllers are responsible for maintaining a record of debtor accounts. This ensures that outstanding invoices get paid on time.
They are also responsible for performing credit checks with newly acquired customers, handling issues regarding invoice payments, and calculating month-end balances.
Credit controllers must communicate with the management on any unresolved problems and possible debtor problems.
Businesses, especially in manufacturing, use credit control to make sure that sales are realized as cash or liquid resources.
Credit control helps to prevent a business from becoming insolvent due to uncoordinated and improperly issued credit to customers.
The Credit Controller (also known as Credit Officer) is responsible for recovering money owed to the organization by customers. These debts can be from individuals (consumer collection) or businesses (commercial collection). To help the company manage its cash flow, the credit function is vital in the finance department.
Credit Controller Job Description
Below are the credit controller job description examples you can use to develop your resume or write a credit controller job description for your employee. Employers can also use it to sieve out job seekers when choosing candidates for interviews.
- Developing and maintaining a credit control program in collaboration with finance, sales, and executives
- Establishing policies to ensure customers pay on time and follow best customer service practices should be established.
- Checking consumers’ credit reports and approving or denying any applications. Then, you can communicate the decisions to the right personnel promptly.
- Setting loan terms and conditions according to consumer agreements and negotiating payment plans.
- Keeping track of all loan transactions, analyzing credit-control systems regularly, and making changes as necessary to reduce bad debts.
- Reporting any payment problems to the management or the relevant team.
- Paying any outstanding invoices or payments promptly and following up if necessary.
- Finding ways to improve the collection of your debts.
- Implementing policies and procedures that guarantee timely payments while maintaining high customer retention.
- Reconciling complicated accounts that were escalated by the AR team
- Monitoring debtor balances to reduce DSO
- Ensuring that credit collection policies and procedures within your organization are adhered to
- Liaising with customers and internal staff, including the sales team.
- Evaluating new credit requests and client credit checks.
- Collecting and managing company debtors.
- Setting up terms of credits for clients
- Negotiating payment plans.
- Collecting all payments and debts
- Answering client questions.
- Processing invoices for debts paid
- Preparing reports and statements for the company accountant.
- Managing the sales ledger
- Liaising with customers, and the sales team.
- Assuming a proactive role in the collection and management of company debts
- Reviewing customers’ credit scores with banks and evaluating new credit requests
- Setting up terms and conditions for credit
- Ensuring timely payment
- Following up on payments as necessary
- Negotiating re-payment plans
- Answering relevant client inquiries
- Reconciling and processing of invoices
- Checking and posting of receipts to the accounting systems
- Preparing and submitting debts statements
- Checking the customer credit ratings
- Setting up the terms and conditions for a loan
- Collecting customers’ debt payments promptly and effectively
- Negotiating re-payment plans
- Maintaining contact with clients to ensure that invoices are accurate for payment
- Solving queries internally and externally related to outstanding invoices
- Posting daily receipts and allocating them to accounting systems
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree required in mathematics, accounting, and finance.
- Previous experience as a credit controller.
- A good understanding of the legal complexities involved in loans, payment plans, interest rates, and other financial matters.
- Expertise in Office and Accounting Software
- Ability to reconcile complex accounts.
- Strong communication skills.
- Ability to deal with difficult clients.
Essential Skills
- Superb communication skills
A conversation can vary from being simple to complex. This particular skill involves many elements: message, sender, and receiver.
Communication can be more than what is said. Body language, which is a subtle form of communication, can serve as stimuli and elicit a response. Communication is about sharing meaning and emotions effectively and clearly.
A good credit controller should be able to read between the lines, assess whether people will actually follow through on the promises made, and sometimes show empathy.
Therefore, in this kind of circumstance, admirable communication skills are crucial.
- Negotiation skills
Negotiation is when two parties reach a settlement or an agreement in which each side gives back something in exchange for the offer.
After the agreement is signed, both parties will be expected to keep their word. Negotiation is about putting together a variety of things, such as communication, conflict avoidance, and persuasion.
These are integrative by nature and are all essential for being a skilled negotiator. A credit controller who is skilled at negotiation can win relationships with even the most difficult customers.
Credit control requires the ability to communicate with people from all aspects of life.
- Confidence
Confidence is a strong belief in one’s ability to accomplish a task or job. One might be unable to pursue opportunities that are in line with one’s abilities if one lacks self-confidence.
Confidence is key to being able to talk to people about money comfortably and get them to agree on terms that will benefit both of you.
Money is a sensitive topic for many people. It takes skill to deal with such a complex issue.
To deal with this appropriately, you must have the following:
Conviction in your abilities
The determination to overcome excuses
Ability to show empathy.
People often feel embarrassed or defensive when asked about their financial status. Credit controllers must have confidence in their knowledge and skills.
- Persistence
People find it easier to stay in their comfort zone and relax than to take on the risk of facing uncertainty, fear, or risk when pursuing a goal. Many people desire to do great things, but not many realize that it is possible to plan for a more worthwhile goal.
A lot of people give up when the journey gets difficult and demanding. Only a few people have the rare ability to overcome all obstacles.
Persistence is more than a skill. It can be considered a master skill by some individuals.
It’s a practical skill that helps people overcome setbacks and difficulties.
- Self-control
Self-control refers to the mental ability to control impulsive emotions and frustrations while focusing on a particular topic to make a decision.
Self-control can be a skill that helps you avoid situations and people that are aggressive or upsetting. Different people react differently to similar situations.
Situations in which people assume or think the worst of you, such as accusing you of wrongdoing. It takes self-control to remain calm and be kind to the other person.
You can keep calm in such a situation and find a solution that is mutually beneficial for both of you.
- Strong IT skills
Technology has revolutionized almost all industries. Professionals in any field must be familiar with the technology in their industry.
Credit controllers should be familiar with certain IT systems to perform data entry, retrieve information, and record payments.
Depending on the situation and the customer type, there may be times when one must perform all of the above. Credit controllers need to be able to log in to specific databases to access credit records, create and maintain customer accounts, and import and export data. They are often involved in the manipulation of numbers and it is important to have proficiency in this area.
You are expected to show professionalism and trust when dealing with the funds of others. These are the tasks that require numeric knowledge. They are constantly working with numbers and figures.
You must have excellent math skills and experience in customer service accounting and credit control will help you.
- Organizational skills
The success of any venture depends on how well an organization works, which includes the role of a credit controller. The importance of organizational skills in this profession cannot be overemphasized. Organizational skills are essential to ensure productivity and manage time, resources, as well as workload.
A credit controller who is organized will know the status of sales and be able to make informed decisions.
Credit controllers can monitor sales reliably using a system and keep detailed records of all calls and commitments.
- Adaptability
Flexibility is another name for adaptability. It is the ability to change one’s methods or actions to fit a new situation. Adaptability is a key ingredient in productivity and resilience.
Credit controllers must be able to correctly interpret new circumstances and draw positive outcomes from them. A professional credit controller can create a payment plan that is mutually beneficial for both the customer and the company by using active listening skills and great negotiation skills.
Diplomacy is a good strategy to maintain a relationship with a customer who is very important and contributes a significant amount to cash flow.
- Humor
People always seek out human contact in commercial transactions between customers and businesses.
Interpersonal skills include the ability to be funny and respectful, as well as showing concern for others’ welfare.
- Analytical skills
Analytical skills allow you to analyze information. It involves taking complex phenomena and looking at each part and coming up with logical conclusions.
Analytical skills are essential to solving problems and making evidence-based decisions that result in productivity.
While analytical skills may sound like something you would enjoy, it is a practical term that almost everyone uses in their day to some degree.
Analytical skills have many components. They include observation, inferring information, assimilation of new info, hypothesizing, making decisions based on a range of factors and options.
- Decision-making skill
Decisions can have a significant impact on the outcomes of any given circumstance, regardless of whether they are good or bad. If we make informed decisions, we can avoid any harm and produce a more productive result.
Management includes the decision-making function, along with other functions such as organizing, planning, and controlling.
It is the act of choosing from two or more options to reach the desired goal.
Every role or capacity in an organization’s work requires decision-making.
- Team management skills
For an organization to succeed and reach its goals, it must be able to manage a team. It involves the coordination of several people to achieve a shared goal.
Communication, goal setting, collaboration, and performance appraisal are some of the components of teamwork. A team can have problems or conflicts while they are working on a task. To identify and resolve these issues, a credit controller must be able to help.
Before a group can be successful in working together, they must first go through several phases. These include storming, norming, and performing.
The leader of a team must keep an eye out for common problems and be prepared to fix them.
- Management of debt recovery
A credit controller’s core job is to be able to manage debt recovery. A company must find smart ways to manage non-performing assets so it can continue to be successful.
To make debt recovery effective, you must arrest defaults and create NPA.
In addition, the credit controller must initiate loan default.
- Writing skills
Credit controllers must keep accurate records of accounts and details. Writing and comprehension go hand-in-hand, as the ability to give written instructions is closely related to understanding correspondence so that you can respond correctly.
How to Become a Credit Controller
You might consider taking a college course to help you acquire the necessary skills for this job. You can choose from:
- Level 3 Diploma or Certificate in Financial Studies or
- Level 2 or 3 Diplomas in Credit Management
You might be able to enter this position through an intermediate apprenticeship as a credit controller or accounting and financial assistant. A credit controller or debt collection specialist could also be an option.
As many large companies offer training, you can apply to become a credit controller directly.
Credit Controller Salary Scale
A Credit Controller earns an average salary of $78,613 annually. Based on experience, education, and location, the exact salary can vary. Credit controllers typically work for between two and four years.