PR - General Service Bureau Wins BBB Integrity Award

 
General Service Bureau, Inc. (GSB), a nationwide collection agency serving primarily healthcare creditors, announced today it has received the prestigious Better Business Bureau (BBB) Integrity Award for 2007.

The BBB Integrity Awards were created to gain public recognition for businesses that go “above and beyond” in serving their customers, suppliers, employees and communities.  GSB earned the award after an independent panel of judges evaluated all entries for 2007 and determined that GSB has consistently demonstrated high standards of behavior in its business practices. 

This award bestowed on GSB is particularly noteworthy at a time when the collection industry’s largest trade group, ACA International, is negotiating changes to its complaint resolution program that could place it under the administration of a third-party such as the BBB. As ACA seeks to improve the public image of the collection industry, association members have been encouraged to make responsiveness to consumers a top priority. The BBB Integrity Award recognizes GSB’s longstanding commitment to this practice.

Commenting on the award, GSB President Bob Leavitt noted, “We are humbled and honored to receive this incredible award.  It is a culmination of our staff’s commitment to our mission of enhancing the financial well being of others and speaks well of our Professional Practices Management System (PPMS) certification.  How we live our mission through our PPMS certification surely was one of the primary drivers of the BBB’s outside judges’ decision to grant us this unique accolade.  We are extremely proud of how our staff’s integrity shows through our PPMS certification and how we as an organization have made it the only way we do business.”

According to ACA International’s website, “PPMS is a management system for collection agencies based upon developing, implementing and adhering to a set of industry-specific professional practices and policies.”  PPMS covers 17 distinct areas of operations, and certification holders are free to define their own procedures in relation to the standards.

Past winners of the award have included Cox Communications and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Nebraska, among other companies that are household names around the country.  “The BBB Integrity Award Winners have shown that ethics and integrity are core values of their organizations,” said Jim Hegarty of the BBB.  He continued, “The 2007 BBB Integrity Award Winners join an elite group of organizations that realize dealing fairly and honestly with employees, customers and partners is central to profitability and growth.”

Other goals of the BBB Integrity Awards program are to “highlight the importance of corporate conscience and responsibility in fulfilling a company’s obligation to the marketplace to do what is right and fair,” and to “demonstrate to the business community that adhering to BBB ethical standards is the hallmark of successful, competitive companies.”