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[HollowOak]

If you are a lender on Prosper.com and find that the following applies to you, you might be interested.

Recently many loans that were in one or other form of "Late" status has been removed from collections. On inquiring why, I was informed that these loans were being switched to a new collections agency.

Apparently I was not given the option to vote on the switch, since my default agency is not Penncro. This is regardless of the fact that I have many late loans that are with Penncro.

I feel this is in a direct violation of my lender's agreement (a legal document) with Prosper.

If you have not been consulted by PMI about a switch of your loans from one collection agency to another, and you want to act on that issue, please contact me by PM.

This is not a discussion on whether the switch is beneficial to lenders or not, frankly, I don't care. At issue is whether PMI can exclude me from the decision-making process based on some arbitrary criteria.

Note that if you decide to join me on acting on this issue, it may cost you some money. How much will be decided at a future time, but I'm thinking that the opt-in may require a snickers, just so I know that those who decide to join me are serious. No firm decision on this has yet been taken.

[112233]

I dont think Prosper wants to accept the fact the lenders actually own their notes.

[caliostro]

I fall in the category you describe, Hollow Oak. I've always had FirstSource CA selected as default, and never overrode that selection when making bids. As a result, I haven't received any communication from Prosper on this matter.

Do I feel I should have been given a voice in the matter? Yes. Do I care enough to explore some sort of action over this issue? Probably not. Sorry.

[Mark12547]

Prosper just sent a new letter out:

**** We recently sent the following note to lenders on whom PennCro was selected as their default agency.  In creating that mailing list, we failed to account for those lenders for whom PennCro was the agency (default or selected) on bids associated with active loans but for whom PennCro was no longer their default agency.  This was a mistake.  We apologize for the oversight.  If you wish to retain PennCro as your agency, please send an email with the subject line of “Retain PennCro” to collectionstesting@prosper.com.

If you have any questions regarding the authenticity or content of this email, please contact Douglas Fuller, VP-Operations. ****

Decision Required: New Collections Agency for Prosper Lenders

[my PII]:

Prosper recently added AmSher as a new collection agency to the Prosper Marketplace.  We chose AmSher after an extensive review of several collection agencies. Our selection process included reference calls with other consumer lenders as well as on-site visits and systems reviews.  AmSher came highly recommended and the recommendation was confirmed in the course of our due diligence.  In addition to the strong recommendation, an excellent track record, we were also impressed with the strength of their systems environment.

AmSher is a family owned business founded in 1939, headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama.  Martin Sher (Co-CEO) serves on the Board of Directors of the ACA (America Collectors Association) and Melanie Sher (President) is Past President of the Alabama Collectors Association.

We have received a number of complaints about the effectiveness of PennCro as a collection agency for Prosper loans. Over the past few months we have worked intensively with PennCro to improve their collections, however, the results were not to our expectations, and more importantly, to the expectations of Prosper lenders.

One common way to improve collections is to do “champion/challenger” testing, where some accounts are sent to one collection agency (the “champion”) and a similar number and quality of accounts are sent to another agency (the “challenger”). To date, Prosper does not have a large enough pool of delinquent accounts to conduct traditional champion/challenger testing on a side-by-side basis.  However, a key aspect of champion/challenger is that the agency losing the challenge is penalized by accounts being removed from them.

In this instance, PennCro has not achieved our monthly production targets , and we are therefore  recommending that accounts currently designated for PennCro be re-designated to AmSher. The compensation percentage paid to AmSher on these existing accounts will be the same as the percentage paid to Penncro. You may, however, elect to keep your delinquent accounts with PennCro.

If you wish your existing Notes to remain at PennCro, please send an email to collectionstesting@prosper.com with subject of “Retain PennCro” by Monday, February 4, 2008, otherwise all your existing Notes designated for service by PennCro will be automatically transferred to AmSher and no further action is required.   As usual, if there are multiple Lenders on a loan to a borrower, Prosper will use the selected collection agency common to the Lender or Lenders who have the greatest ownership interest in the loan. In the event of a tie among the Lenders as to their choice of a collection agency, the account will be re-designated to AmSher.

Thank you for your immediate attention in the matter.

Sincerely,

Prosper


CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT: [boilerplate was here but it's worthless specifically because it is boilerplate text.]

[Mark12547]

If you wish your existing Notes to remain at PennCro, please send an email to collectionstesting@prosper.com with subject of “Retain PennCro” by Monday, February 4, 2008

(emphasis added)

Well, they goofed again--the email was timestamped 2:14pm today, February 15, 2008. It's hard to send a reply 11 days before the message is sent. 

[Fred93]

Well, they goofed again--the email was timestamped 2:14pm today, February 15, 2008. It's hard to send a reply 11 days before the message is sent. 

But you gotta admit ... They're getting closer.

[ks6328]

If you wish your existing Notes to remain at PennCro, please send an email to collectionstesting@prosper.com with subject of “Retain PennCro” by Monday, February 4, 2008

(emphasis added)

Well, they goofed again--the email was timestamped 2:14pm today, February 15, 2008. It's hard to send a reply 11 days before the message is sent. 

That's because in our discussion in various threads here on .org about what they should have done, we never mentioned that they'd need to adjust the date if they sent out another email.   

(Hey JW, you folks gotta do at least a little thinking on your own!)
 

[112233]

If you wish your existing Notes to remain at PennCro, please send an email to collectionstesting@prosper.com with subject of “Retain PennCro” by Monday, February 4, 2008

(emphasis added)

Well, they goofed again--the email was timestamped 2:14pm today, February 15, 2008. It's hard to send a reply 11 days before the message is sent. 

you didnt reply do the fumail by feb 4th? shame on you

[Fred93]

Did these messages (the 1/28 one and the new oops one) come from prosper, or were they mailed thru that outside bulk-mail agency they use for newsletters etc?

I ask because I didn't receive either one.

[cowdog]

I got the first one but not the second (but then I have no active bids or loans).

Fred, my email says it was sent by: Collection Testing (collectionstesting@prosper.com), mailed to my email address of record.

Rather sloppy that Prosper didn't also send a copy as a message to my Prosper account.

[ks6328]

Did these messages (the 1/28 one and the new oops one) come from prosper, or were they mailed thru that outside bulk-mail agency they use for newsletters etc?

I ask because I didn't receive either one.

As with the member description warning letters, it came from Prosper, but not through their usual mail server.  The sending server was smtp1.circleone.com.  The usual sending server for mail direct from Prosper is mx1.prosper.com.

And as with the member description warning letters, it did NOT include my screen name, even though all legitimate emails from Prosper are supposed to.  (Prosper doesn't follow their own security precautions, what a surprise ... NOT!)
 

[Shenandoah]

Did these messages (the 1/28 one and the new oops one) come from prosper, or were they mailed thru that outside bulk-mail agency they use for newsletters etc?

I ask because I didn't receive either one.

Did you have PennCro set as your default agency for any of your bids?

My understanding is the first round went out to those that had PennCro set as a default agency, and the second round went out to those that had PennCro set as the default agency when they bid but had later changed their default to another agency.

I don't see any indication that anything went out to lenders that had another agency selected as their default but ended up on PennCro serviced loans.

[HollowOak]

My offer in the first post in this thread is now no longer available. Thank you for your interest to those who replied. You should have received a PM from me.

[Fred93]

Did you have PennCro set as your default agency for any of your bids?

Sure.  Was set to Penncro for gee, must be a year or so.  However, I have no idea how it was set ont he day, at the instant, that Prosper ran the incorrect script, ie the one that looked to see how the default was set and decided who to send the mail to.  I changed my default to Amsher right after they sent the mail announcing that Amsher had appeared.

My understanding is the first round went out to those that had PennCro set as a default agency, and the second round went out to those that had PennCro set as the default agency when they bid but had later changed their default to another agency.

All this talk about default agencies is a clear indication of how confused the person who did this is.  They shouldn't be doing ANYTHING depending on the default agency.  Everything should depend on the agency associated with each individual bid.  That may be the default agency and may not be the default agency.

I don't see any indication that anything went out to lenders that had another agency selected as their default but ended up on PennCro serviced loans.

The 2nd letter (which I also have never received, and only know about because of this forum) clearly says something about default or bid, so they understand that problem now.  If it can be taken on face value, I should have received the 2nd letter, but I did not.

How hard can this be?

[traveler505]

All this talk about default agencies is a clear indication of how confused the person who did this is.  They shouldn't be doing ANYTHING depending on the default agency.  Everything should depend on the agency associated with each individual bid.  That may be the default agency and may not be the default agency.

Wrong.  They are even more confused than you think.

Under the Lender Registration Agreement, the determining factor is the agency that a lender selected when he registered as a lender, not the agency that he selected when he placed a particular bid.  There is no provision for a lender to change his default agency once the initial selection is made, or to switch agencies each time he places a bid.

6. Collection of Delinquent Loans. As part of the registration process, you will be asked, among other things, to select from among two or more unaffiliated collection agencies and designate which collection agency Prosper is to use in the event a borrower fails to make payments when due under a Note. In the event a monthly payment on a Note is not received on or before the due date for the payment, you agree that in servicing such Note Prosper will take the following steps:

*  *  *

c. When a payment becomes thirty (30) days past due, Prosper will assign the loan account to the collection agency you selected at the time of registration. If there are multiple Lenders on a loan to a borrower, and one or more of the other Lenders selects a collection agency different from the one you selected, you agree that Prosper will use the selected collection agency common to the Lender or Lenders who have the greatest ownership interest in the loan. In the event of a tie among the Lenders as to their choice of a collection agency, the agency will be selected at random by Prosper. The borrower's identity, contact information and other personally identifiable information will be provided to the collection agency to which the delinquent Note is assigned for collection, but you will not be provided with any such borrower information.