When Claudia Hetscher signed her employment contract in 2011, she had no idea that she would become part of an ambitious experiment. Her previous employer, the long-established Forum Inkasso, had just been taken over by a team of founders who wanted to do many things in a new and different way. “There were only about 25 of us, and we had a lot of questions,” she recalls. What followed was not a gentle evolution, but a cultural revolution.

The new owners had a theory that was previously unknown in the industry: debt collection and customer friendliness should not be mutually exclusive. At the time, this claim felt like an attempt to mix oil and water.

The revolution begins

Dormagen, 2010. A small team is working on this idea on the ground floor. While established collection agencies rely on tried-and-tested—some would say outdated—methods, the founders are venturing a different approach: debt management should be based on partnership, fairness, and above all, increasingly digital. The debtor is not seen as a debtor, but as a customer.

Hetscher quickly learned what this meant in practice at her own desk. In her early days, it was still part of everyday life to collect paper bank statements and enter each payment manually. Files piled up on the shelves. “When we digitized everything, we didn’t know that this was just the beginning,” she says today.

The beginning of what? Of a transformation that would catapult the company from a regional service provider to a European player within a decade and a half. Today, more than 900 people work for coeo in eight countries. More than 6.5 million debt collection cases are processed annually. Turnover is around 260 million euros.

Tailwind from Sweden

But growth alone does not make history. The decisive turning point came with a name that carries weight in the financial world: Klarna. When the Swedish payment service provider chose coeo as its partner, a lot changed.

“The Klarna mandate made us realize the potential of our systems,” says Eveline Püschel, who witnessed this moment firsthand. “From then on, everything moved much faster.” What she means is that the in-house technology suddenly had to handle volumes for which it was not originally designed. Instead of failing, the team learned, grew, and continued to innovate.

One key result of this learning curve is now known as cAI. It is a platform that combines various AI modules into a holistic AI ecosystem – from a voice agent that automatically answers calls to a decision navigator that controls processes. The figures are impressive: in 2024, AI systems answered over 800,000 calls, around 60 percent of which were handled entirely without human intervention. In email management, the system processes over 700,000 messages annually.

Automation with a human touch

But what does this mean for the people who once pored over paper files? In conversations with employees who have been with the company since the beginning, it is clear that technology is not seen as competition. Rather, it is viewed as a powerful tool for even greater customer focus. “AI does not replace people, it empowers them,” is the official credo. It takes care of routine tasks and creates space for quality. And it allows specialists to concentrate on the more demanding aspects of their work. This is another reason for the continuous growth of the coeo team.

Sarah Lehmann, who joined the company in 2012 and is now Head of Marketing & Public Relations, puts it this way: “When I think back to how we started with just under 40 people and see where we are today, it’s pretty amazing.” The key to success? “Team spirit. At coeo, everyone has always contributed wherever they could.”

In addition to technological advances, this success story also has a lot to do with expertise and skills. According to the company’s own figures, each employee completed an average of 27 training courses in 2024. This is an indication that qualifications can keep pace with technological change.

Structure and speed

In 2024, coeo went one step further. With the founding of cAI Technology GmbH and the establishment of an AI lab in Berlin, the company signaled that it does not view high tech as a by-product, but rather as its core business.

Lutz Reingen, who joined the company in 2012 and is now Director of Sales & Client Management, clearly describes the development: “We have continuously evolved—becoming more professional, more digital, and more structured.” At the same time, he emphasizes what he believes has remained constant: customer focus and personal responsibility.

The organizational structure has also become increasingly professional. Clear areas such as operations, IT, business intelligence, and cAI development now form the framework. Internally, the company’s motto is to “always be the speedboat, never the tanker.” This means being agile enough to respond quickly to new mandates or regulatory requirements.

The measurable results speak for themselves: a customer satisfaction rating of 4.6 stars based on over 36,000 reviews and return rates of over 85 percent. The company also has impressive figures to show in terms of sustainability: between 2022 and 2024, CO₂ emissions were reduced by 29 percent across the group, and 78 percent of the vehicle fleet is now electric.

The industry experiment becomes an innovation leader

What remains after 15 years? A company that has developed from a start-up into an international player. One that relies on a combination of technology and the aspiration to make debt collection humane and service-oriented. And one that sees itself as a driving force in an industry that has long been considered backward.

“Standing still was never an option,” is the internal mantra. Whether the project to permanently combine algorithms and empathy will continue to be successful remains to be seen in the coming years. The infrastructure for it is in place.

The employee statements quoted come from the company’s own sources.

Cover image: © coeo Inkasso