A well-established Iowa law firm with a diverse legal practice and a strong reputation for client service is seeking a Creditors' Rights Paralegal to join their team in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. This role is ideal for an experienced collections or litigation paralegal who can manage creditor-side matters, work directly with debtors and creditors, and help move cases through the full collections and litigation process. The position offers a $60,000-$80,000 base salary plus a 2% bonus on collections, creating significant earning potential for a high-performing professional.
What You'll Do as the Creditors' Rights Paralegal:
- Serve as a primary point of contact for debtors, including confirming identity, providing required disclosures, documenting calls, and handling payment-related conversations
- Manage debtor information, case activity, payment history, and notes within the firm's collections case management system
- Establish payment plans and process payment authorizations
- Review debtor payments and prepare regular payment and collection reports
- Negotiate settlements and prepare settlement agreements
- Coordinate trial settings, judgment debtor examinations, hearings, and trial preparation
- Prepare attorneys for hearings and trials by organizing files, documents, and case information
- Review files for suit and support the administrative process of filing collection actions
- Draft complaints, petitions, praecipes, wage garnishments, discovery requests, summary judgment motions, and affidavits of account
- Prepare and send demand letters and other collection correspondence
- Coordinate service fees and filing-related correspondence with sheriffs and other parties
- Communicate with creditors, forwarders, and other collection-related stakeholders
- Accept and process forwarder claims
- Maintain case calendars and docket deadlines related to demands, appeals, pleadings, hearings, and other litigation activity
- Maintain accurate case records and ensure files are complete and current
- Manage collection remittances and payment reporting on a daily, biweekly, and monthly basis
- Prepare deposits and coordinate banking activity for multiple firm accounts
- Retrieve and process firm mail and support other administrative functions related to collections operations
- Support the attorney and firm with additional creditors' rights and litigation-related projects as needed
Must-Haves as the Creditors' Rights Paralegal:
- At least 5 years of experience in a legal, collections, creditors' rights, civil litigation, or closely related environment
- Strong understanding of collections, creditors' rights, litigation administration, or a similar legal practice area
- Ability to manage multiple deadlines, case files, and competing priorities with a high level of accuracy
- Strong written and verbal communication skills
- Ability to communicate professionally and respectfully with debtors, creditors, attorneys, courts, and other stakeholders
- Strong organizational skills and attention to detail
- Ability to work independently while collaborating closely with the attorney and firm staff
- Comfort handling confidential financial, legal, and client information
- A professional, personable, and collaborative approach to working with a predominantly female office team
Nice-to-Haves as the Creditors' Rights Paralegal:
- Previous experience with CLS, Commercial Legal Software, Collection-Master, or Vertican platforms
- Experience with other collections case management systems such as Q-Law or JST
- Experience with WordPerfect
- Experience with wage garnishments, judgment debtor examinations, creditor claims, or collection litigation
- Experience drafting pleadings, discovery, motions for summary judgment, or affidavits of account
- Experience working in a small or midsize law firm
- Paralegal education or an associate's or bachelor's degree in paralegal studies, accounting, business, or a related field
This Role Offers:
- Base salary of $60,000-$80,000, depending on experience and qualifications
- 2% bonus paid on all collections generated through the firm's collection work
- Uncapped performance-based earning potential
- A compensation structure that can create substantial total earning potential for a high-performing professional
- Health insurance with approximately 50% of the employee's monthly premium paid by the firm
- 401(k) plan with employer contributions
- Safe harbor retirement contribution after one year of employment
- Additional discretionary profit-sharing potential after the second year
- Strong PTO program
- A stable, locally owned law firm with a long-standing reputation in the market
- Opportunity to work with a respected and growing organization that continues to expand its regional presence
- A supportive, professional work environment with meaningful responsibility and autonomy
- The opportunity to play a central role in a high-volume creditors' rights and collections practice
Skills Required
- At least 5 years of experience in legal, collections, creditors' rights, civil litigation, or closely related environment
- Strong understanding of collections, creditors' rights, litigation administration, or similar legal practice area
- Ability to manage multiple deadlines, case files, and competing priorities with high accuracy
- Strong written and verbal communication skills
- Ability to communicate professionally with debtors, creditors, attorneys, courts, and stakeholders
- Strong organizational skills and attention to detail
- Ability to work independently while collaborating closely with attorneys and firm staff
- Comfort handling confidential financial, legal, and client information
- Professional, personable, and collaborative approach to working with the office team
What We Do
Who are we? As an independent, full-service marketing and consulting business based in Portland, Maine, we provide strategy, content and design for businesses, nonprofits and individuals in Maine and throughout the world. What do we do? Everything we do revolves around ROI—improving your bottom line. Through a rock-solid communication and branding strategy, we show you how to support and engage your employees, build your workforce, find new clients and support existing business. Here’s a snapshot of our services: Strategy: Branding and rebranding; mission statement; search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine results page (SERP); hiring and retention; fundraising; communicating with board members; personal branding (for executives); events and PR; advertising campaigns; product launches; social media campaigns and management. Design: Websites; logos; promotional material (digital and print); event guides; employee photos; drone video footage; custom magazines; advertisements. Content: Website text; speeches and keynotes; promotional text; employee bios; custom articles; social media posts; newsletters and internal emails; corporate reports. Custom Publishing: Vanguard, Equity, Toggle, Blueprint, Vision, Terra Firma What’s our mission? We want to help you solve real challenges—like growing your business, hiring and retaining employees, fundraising and keeping existing business. Our mission is to do this with honesty and integrity. Authenticity—it’s a good look on you. Why do we do this? We want to reimagine marketing. We want it to be less about the perfect image, and more about using good communication and branding as a way to engage with your employees and clients in successful and lasting relationships. Ultimately, we believe this approach will create a world where people come before profit, where the environment is respected and given back to, and where good business is synonymous with the best intentions.
