Debt collection

The FTC sent a summary of its 2015 work on debt collection practices to the CFPB to include in the CFPB’s annual report to Congress on the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. The FTC and the CFPB share enforcement responsibilities under the FDCPA.

FCRA and TCPA cases were much higher in January compared with January 2015 (+31.4% and +39.8% respectively) but that follows a multi-year trend for the two statutes that doesn’t seem to be easing, according to data collected from U.S. district courts.

For the last nine months, marketplace lenders have been hoping the Supreme Court would save them from a lower-court ruling that raised fundamental questions about their business model.

A Pennsylvania federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit accusing debt collector LMM Management of using the letterhead of an allegedly sham law firm to convince thousands of borrowers to pay delinquent debts.

In our first piece on collecting through litigation, we noted that the soft financial market and uneven regulatory landscape have led to a great deal of waste and loss of profitability in collecting unpaid debt. Now, we describe new systems that will employ technology to help litigation processes and return them to profitability.

The FTC and the State of Florida have obtained settlements with a group of defendants who participated in a tech support scheme that allegedly defrauded thousands of consumers out of millions of dollars.

Legal collections took a backseat to other financial processes in the wake of the recession. But with the job market showing strength and the related assumption that defaulting borrowers are regaining the capacity to pay back debt, it’s expected collection revenue via litigation will grow in 2016.

The IRS won't meet the March 1 deadline to sign contracts with private debt collection agencies to collect unpaid tax debt.

WASHINGTON — State regulators and House lawmakers warned the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau not to preempt state laws when the agency issues its proposal to regulate payday-type loans.

Capital Payments LLC, an Independent Sales Organization (ISO), has agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it allowed a telemarketing scheme called The Tax Club to use merchant accounts to process consumers’ credit card payments.