Washington County approves contract with outside collector to pursue delinquent personal-property and mobile-home taxes

The Washington County Board of Supervisors approved entering an open-ended contract with American Financial Credit Services for collection of delinquent personal-property and mobile-home taxes, conditioned on review and approval by the county attorney.

Dean Frang, representing American Financial Credit Services, told the board the company works in eight states and that Mississippi law allows assessment of up to a 25% fee on collections. He described the company’s approach to locating taxpayers, taking payment plans, and returning cleared principal amounts to counties. “Per Mississippi statute, it allows 25%,” Frang said at the meeting. He said his company typically pursues delinquencies going back seven years and that prior clients reported improved on-time payments in subsequent years.

Supervisors asked a range of operational and legal questions, including whether collection activity would affect taxpayers’ credit and how long the vendor would hold funds under payment plans. Frang said the company does not report debts to credit bureaus as a regular practice and that the county’s money is sent promptly when a year’s liabilities are paid in full. He also said the contract is open-ended and can be terminated with 30 days’ notice if the county is dissatisfied.

The board approved a motion to authorize the contract subject to county attorney review; the motion carried and staff were directed to provide the contract to the attorney for final sign-off. County staff explained the recommendation was intended to reduce ongoing collection mailing and postage costs and to increase recovery of long-standing delinquencies.

Next steps: the county attorney will review the proposed contract and return recommended language or conditions to the board; staff will circulate the final contract and a timeline for implementation if approved.