The Check Is In The Mail

 One of the things you learn in competitive business or commerce, those activities wherein one is providing goods or services to customers, is the creativity of some of your customers who are not doing well in trying to keep getting a supply of your goods and services without paying for them on the same terms as others.  Hence the title of this report.  The most common placation offered by someone who wants your goods but can’t pay for them or is behind on paying for the previous order is, “The check is in the mail.”

Businesses compete with others to sell their goods and services and business don’t want to lose a customer and customers know this fact.  So another common ploy of the struggling customer is to threaten to go to a competitor supplier.

When things get real bad and the suppliers have to chase the customer to collect their accounts receivable, frequently the customer will stop answering the phone and ignore other forms of collection activity such as mailings and calls from attorneys and collection agencies.

Sometime during this process the supplier reluctantly concludes that the customer is no longer credit worthy and it is at this time that they put that customer on payment terms known as COD or cash on delivery. In other words, no goods or services unless the payment in received in cash at or before delivery of the goods and services.

COD.  Cash on Delivery.

Last night the president of the United States attained COD status.  He has been working in that direction for some time.  The credit card that is issued to him has no more room for credit.  He, of course, doesn’t need credit to run his business; he needs it to run his campaign for reelection.  And the reason he still needs credit is because he has been in the business of promising to deliver certain results – his version of a product, to a receptive audience.  Namely, more jobs; better roads, fixed up bridges; hard working school teachers successfully educating children and, most of all, an effective but very large bureaucratic team that is delivering on their mission which is a successful, competitive and growing economy that is not only keeping up with others but is surpassing them.   He asked for more credit to keep doing all of the above and he forgot to mention that all of his past efforts have not worked. 

We do have a very large bureaucracy, that is for sure, but our economy is not successful.  We are not making more goods in the United States and selling them to others.  Others are making more goods and selling them to us.  Our roads have not been fixed and neither have our bridges.   Our urban schools are overwhelmed with teacher’s union rules and poor performance and, as a matter of fact, he endorsed more of the same during his speech.  He actually said he would continue to support the teachers and their union as they fail to deliver for the kids who most need performance. For that reason alone, he is now a COD customer.  If he will not take a stand to give urban kids a good education, in whatever way is necessary, he should be expelled or resign quickly and most certainly no later than November 2012. 

Mr. President you are on COD.  We do not believe you when you say your jobs program and your fix the roads and bridges program and your keep teachers in the classroom program and maintain the largest bureaucracy in the history country program will work.  And perhaps most of all, we do not accept your twisted version of “the check is in the mail” by telling us that it is all paid for.  You have lost your credit line.  We don’t care about your words about it being paid for.  The words are false.  It’s not paid for and we know that.

So, show us the money. 

Show us the cash.

Bring the cash and then we will talk.  You start this time by cutting back and then we will examine how to use the cash that is saved.   Enough with the check is in the mail stuff.  We have provided you with more than enough credit for one term and to fix the mess you inherited.  You have made it worse; much worse.

So, bring the money; the cash.

You’re COD from now on.