Seeking to extend protections afforded to military service members, the Senate could be poised to restrict payday loans for other consumers. The introduced bill, Protecting Consumers from Unreasonable Credit Rates Act, seeks to limit interest rates charged at 36%. If passed it would amend the Truth in Lending Act (TILA) and provide a national usury [...]
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Students who borrowed under federal student loan programs and who subsequently defaulted on their loans are about to experience the power of federal government debt collection. In late 2011, the US Department of Education (“DoE”) intended to receive $1.1 billion in defaulted student loans as the guarantor of last resort from lenders, guarantors, and servicers [...]
Portfolio Recovery Associates LLC, a subsidiary of the publicly-traded Portfolio Recovery Associates, Inc., is a debt collection agency that trades in the junk debt markets. It purchases old, defaulted consumer debts from credit card companies, car finance companies, and others often for just pennies on the dollar. It is a competitor of Asset Acceptance, LLC, [...]
Sometimes a New Jersey consumer may give a sum of money to an insurance company or other entity in exchange for a promised stream of income usually paid monthly (an annuity contract). Other times, an insurance company is given a sum of money on behalf of a consumer to compensate for a personal injury. In [...]
Asset Acceptance Capital Corp. (NASDAQ: AACC), the parent company of the increasingly familiar “Asset Acceptance, LLC,” is a publicly-traded junk debt buyer located in Warren, Michigan. Through its predecessors, it has been in existence in one form or another since 1962. Asset Acceptance is one of the few debt collection agencies where ownership can be [...]
Confirming other recent surveys, studies, and reports, Consumer Federation of America (CFA) publishes a report that reflects the growing epidemic of fraud in the U.S. and from overseas. Debt collection, too, also ranks very high as a source of consumer complaints. In the early part of 2012, CFA contacted state, county, and municipal consumer protection [...]
National Credit Adjusters, LLC is a national “debt clearinghouse” that purchases defaulted payday loans. Grabbing payday loans from all over the nation, National Credit Adjusters attempts to collect them in the respective states. The payday loans associated with Arkansan consumers contain usurious interest rates that are unlawful pursuant to Arkansan law. Arkansas Sues National Credit [...]
Sen. Al Franken (D-MN), a Saturday Night Live sketch comedian (think “Daily Affirmation with Stuart Smalley”), writer, actor, and author, recently introduced legislation in the U.S. Senate to tighten and modernize the nation’s Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). The FDCPA attempts to regulate what and how debt collectors can attempt to collect consumers debts. [...]
Text Messages. A debt collection industry advocate reported on a non-scientific poll where industry visitors were asked how text messages play a role in debt collection. According to LiquidEdge’s June 2012 Industry Poll (of Newport Coast, California), participants were asked to report their use of text messages as a “part of their overall collection strategy.” [...]
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently published its annual report on the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). In this report, the FTC alarmingly highlights a sharp increase in consumer complaints about debt collectors. In 2010, consumers lodged 140,036 complaints against debt collectors; these claims of abuse now account for 27 percent of all [...]