Fair Debt Collection Practices Act
The Fair Debt Collection Practices
Act is a federal law passed in 1977 which outlaws debtor harassment and
other types of collection practices. The act regulates collection
agencies, original creditors who set up a separate office to collect
debts, and lawyers hired by the creditor to help collect overdue bills.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Sec.
801. Short Title
802. Congressional findings and declaration of
purpose
803. Definitions
804. Acquisition of location information
805. Communication in connection with debt
collection
806. Harassment or abuse
807. False or misleading representations
808. Unfair practice
809. Validation of debts
810. Multiple debts
811. Legal actions by debt collectors
812. Furnishing certain deceptive forms
813. Civil liability
814. Administrative enforcement
815. Reports to Congress by the Commission
816. Relation to State laws
817. Exemption for State regulation
818. Effective date
. Short Title [15 USC 1601
note]
This title may be cited as
the "Fair Debt Collection Practices Act."
Congressional findings and declarations of
purpose [15 USC 1692]
(a) There is abundant
evidence of the use of abusive, deceptive, and unfair debt
collection practices by many debt collectors. Abusive debt
collection practices contribute to the number of personal
bankruptcies, to marital instability, to the loss of jobs, and to
invasions of individual privacy.
(b) Existing laws and
procedures for redressing these injuries are inadequate to protect
consumers.
(c) Means other than
misrepresentation or other abusive debt collection practices are
available for the effective collection of debts.
(d) Abusive debt collection
practices are carried on to a substantial extent in interstate
commerce and through means and instrumentalities of such commerce.
Even where abusive debt collection practices are purely intrastate
in character, they nevertheless directly affect interstate commerce.
(e) It is the purpose of this
title to eliminate abusive debt collection practices by debt
collectors, to insure that those debt collectors who refrain from
using abusive debt collection practices are not competitively
disadvantaged, and to promote consistent State action to protect
consumers against debt collection abuses.
. Definitions [15 USC
1692a]
As used in this title --
(1) The term "Commission"
means the Federal Trade Commission.
(2) The term
"communication" means the conveying of information regarding a
debt directly or indirectly to any person through any medium.
(3) The term "consumer"
means any natural person obligated or allegedly obligated to pay
any debt.
(4) The term "creditor"
means any person who offers or extends credit creating a debt or
to whom a debt is owed, but such term does not include any person
to the extent that he receives an assignment or transfer of a debt
in default solely for the purpose of facilitating collection of
such debt for another.
(5) The term "debt" means
any obligation or alleged obligation of a consumer to pay money
arising out of a transaction in which the money, property,
insurance or services which are the subject of the transaction are
primarily for personal, family, or household purposes, whether or
not such obligation has been reduced to judgment.
(6) The term "debt
collector" means any person who uses any instrumentality of
interstate commerce or the mails in any business the principal
purpose of which is the collection of any debts, or who regularly
collects or attempts to collect, directly or indirectly, debts
owed or due or asserted to be owed or due another. Notwithstanding
the exclusion provided by clause (F) of the last sentence of this
paragraph, the term includes any creditor who, in the process of
collecting his own debts, uses any name other than his own which
would indicate that a third person is collecting or attempting to
collect such debts. For the purpose of section 808(6), such term
also includes any person who uses any instrumentality of
interstate commerce or the mails in any business the principal
purpose of which is the enforcement of security interests. The
term does not include --
(A) any officer or
employee of a creditor while, in the name of the creditor,
collecting debts for such creditor;
(B) any person while
acting as a debt collector for another person, both of whom are
related by common ownership or affiliated by corporate control,
if the person acting as a debt collector does so only for
persons to whom it is so related or affiliated and if the
principal business of such person is not the collection of
debts;
(C) any officer or
employee of the United States or any State to the extent that
collecting or attempting to collect any debt is in the
performance of his official duties;
(D) any person while
serving or attempting to serve legal process on any other person
in connection with the judicial enforcement of any debt;
(E) any nonprofit
organization which, at the request of consumers, performs bona
fide consumer credit counseling and assists consumers in the
liquidation of their debts by receiving payments from such
consumers and distributing such amounts to creditors;
and
(F) any person collecting
or attempting to collect any debt owed or due or asserted to be
owed or due another to the extent such activity (i) is
incidental to a bona fide fiduciary obligation or a bona fide
escrow arrangement; (ii) concerns a debt which was originated by
such person; (iii) concerns a debt which was not in default at
the time it was obtained by such person; or (iv) concerns a debt
obtained by such person as a secured party in a commercial
credit transaction involving the creditor.
(7) The term "location
information" means a consumer's place of abode and his telephone
number at such place, or his place of employment.
(8) The term "State" means
any State, territory, or possession of the United States, the
District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, or any
political subdivision of any of the foregoing.
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