One Year Later: How Real-Time Communication Is Keeping Recovery Agents Safer

Last year, on Fallen Agents Day, MBSi introduced a feature built around a simple but powerful belief: when an agent’s life is on the line, there is no room for delay. We launched Violent Event with the goal of cutting through the noise, eliminating lengthy email chains, missed phone calls, and the dangerous lag time that existed between an agent flagging a threat and a lender taking action.

One year in, the results speak for themselves. And today, we want to share what we’ve seen, what we’ve learned, and how we’re continuing to show up for the agents who make this industry run.

Real-Time Communication Is Changing Outcomes

When we built Violent Event, we knew streamlined, timely communication would help keep agents from walking into harm’s way. What we didn’t fully anticipate was just how fast things could move when the right people are notified immediately.

Since rollout in March 2025, we’ve seen cases close in as little as two hours after being marked violent. That kind of response time was nearly unimaginable with the pre-existing workflow, where an agent’s warning might travel through several hands before reaching the lender who could actually act on it. The moment an agent flags a case as violent through RecoveryConnect, the case is automatically flagged as “violent”, and real-time notifications go out to all involved parties — lenders and forwarders alike — simultaneously.

That immediacy matters. It means no other agent is unknowingly dispatched to the same address without knowing the potential dangers. It means lenders can make informed decisions quickly. The communication chain that once took days has been compressed into hours, and in this industry, hours can be the difference between a close call and a tragedy.

How the Violent Event Feature Works

For those new to RecoveryConnect or looking for a refresher, here’s how the feature works in practice.

When an agent encounters a violent or threatening situation, they can mark the case as “violent” directly in web or mobile — quickly and without friction, even in a high-stress moment. They also can add a written statement or attachments like images or a police reports to give clients more context about what occurred.

Once a case is marked violent, two things happen automatically: the case is flagged as “violent”, and notifications are pushed out in real-time to the lenders and forwarders. This flag sticks so that if the case gets flipped to a new forwarder or a new agency – they are in the know and can read the violent event information even before choosing to accept the case. From there, the lenders can decide how to proceed. We have configurations that allow them to auto-hold or auto-close any case marked with violence today. Many choose to auto-hold so repossession activity is stopped and they can review the details to decide their next move. As we shared last year, four out of five lenders surveyed said they would opt to close the case and escalate to their replevin team — and what we’ve seen over the past year reflects that.

The feature remains available to all RecoveryConnect users at no additional charge, because agent safety should never be a premium add-on.

Our Continued Support of the Recovery Agent Benefit Fund

Honoring fallen agents isn’t something we do once a year and set aside. It’s a commitment that carries through everything we build and every partnership we pursue.

We’ve continued to donate to the Recovery Agent Benefit Fund (RABF), which provides financial support to the families of agents who lose their lives in the line of duty. In addition to our direct contributions, we continue to look for opportunities to participate in fundraisers and partner with state associations to help grow the fund. The agents we’ve lost deserve to be remembered, and their families deserve to know this industry stands behind them.

Looking Ahead: Safety Remains the Priority

A year ago, we said that every agent deserves to work in an environment where their safety is a primary concern. That hasn’t changed. If anything, our conviction has grown stronger.

We’ll keep listening to agents, lenders, forwarders, and associations about where the gaps are and what we can do to close them. We’ll keep building tools that make the communication chain faster and smarter. And we’ll keep honoring the legacy of those we’ve lost by doing everything in our power to make sure fewer names are added to that list.

To every agent out there doing this work every day — thank you. We see you, we’re building for you, and your safety will always come first.

Have questions about Violent Event or want to learn more about RecoveryConnect? Call us, text us, or email us. However you want to reach us, we’ll be here to listen and help!

By Heather Ford

SVP of Product & Marketing

MBSi

One Year Later: How Real-Time Communication Is Keeping Recovery Agents Safer – One Year Later: How Real-Time Communication Is Keeping Recovery Agents Safer -One Year Later: How Real-Time Communication Is Keeping Recovery Agents Safer

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