Quantifying the pressure: Why capacity planning is non-negotiable

The debt burden: Average household debt (including mortgages) stands at £66,910. (Nov 2025)

Rising interest: UK households are paying an average of £2,975 per year just in interest payments.

Homes at risk: 67 mortgage possession claims and 53 mortgage possession orders were made every day in England and Wales in July to September 2025.

Statistics from The Money Charity November 2025

Recruit

It may be the right decision to grow your collections team before you become overextended and customer support levels suffer. Investing in new team members who can hopefully commit to years of service, secures your team for the future. 

But, this is an expensive option and one that takes time and resources. You may not see the full benefits in time to solve your current capacity issues. 

To make matters worse, good quality collections advisors are in short supply, hard to recruit and retain. With employment levels relatively high, trainees are harder to find.

If you can recruit successfully, you may be left with too many agents in the longer term, having invested in training and resources for the expanded workforce.

Outsource

Outsourcing makes sense if you want to limit the time and cost burden of recruiting extra staff. It quickly relieves capacity pressures; however, outsourcing inevitably means losing some control over customer experience.

It can be unpopular with customers, potentially upsetting the longer-term creditor/customer relationship. 

Outsourcing works best if you can find the right agency for your needs, but it comes at a cost, which may be hard to sell internally if your organisation is looking to control costs.

Automate

If you prefer to keep control and manage fluctuating demand in-house, automation is the logical choice. Modern technology can deliver results cost-effectively, and business needs can be met quickly. 

For example, digital self-service can take over reminders, payments, arrangements, affordability assessments and more. It transforms contact centre capacity and can flex to meet any level of demand.

Self-service has a positive effect on customer service metrics like first call resolution and call-waiting times.

‍

‍

Conclusion: quick and cost-effective solutions to boost capacity

Managing capacity is a delicate balancing act between expensive overcapacity and overstretched and frazzled staff who can’t meet customers' needs.

Luckily, there is a third route that avoids these pitfalls and is the first choice before launching a recruitment drive or paying for outsourcing.

Automation can focus on those parts of the collections process where gains are immediate, such as digital customer self-service, or to augment existing system shortfalls where time savings will be most effective.

The choice is yours.