On Oct. 8, S.737A was signed into New York law, “requiring debt collectors to inform debtors that written communications are available in large print format.” The legislation becomes effective Nov. 7, 2021.
Posts tagged as “state regulation”
Nevada SB248, which regulates the collection of certain medical debt in the state, becomes effective July 1. The bill, introduced in March 2021, was rushed through the Legislature before it went out of session on June 1. The result is that SB248 is a broken piece of legislation bound to cause harm to medical consumers, the medical collections industry, and health care providers.
On March 15, the California Office of the Attorney General announced that additional regulations relating to the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) had been approved, effective immediately.
On Jan. 19, a federal court in Pennsylvania dismissed a complaint against a debt buyer which alleged violations of the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act stemming from an alleged failure to be licensed under the Pennsylvania Consumer Discount Company Act.
On Jan. 11 Washington State Sen. Reuven Carlyle introduced SB 5062, the Washington Privacy Act (WPA). Its predecessors, SB 6281 and SB 5376, failed to pass in 2020 and 2019, respectively.
During what was an extraordinary and difficult year, there was an abundance of activity at the state and federal levels and a good deal of it was driven by the present COVID-19 pandemic. Here is my take on some of the most significant regulatory activities from the past year in consumer debt collection that will continue to impact both consumers and creditors in the years to come.
On Sept. 9, 2020, California Assembly Bill 1885 was enacted, significantly increasing the amount of California’s homestead exemption. The amendment becomes effective Jan. 1, 2021.
On March 26, the Texas attorney general acted swiftly, filing a lawsuit against Auctions Unlimited LLC over an online auction that ended on March 24. The auction sparked an article published by the Chicago Tribune entitled “more than 750,000 masks auctioned for huge markup in Texas while hospitals run out nationwide.”
The Massachusetts attorney general has adopted a regulation deeming it illegal for a debt collector to telephone a Massachusetts resident to request payment of a debt or for a debt collector or a creditor to file a lawsuit to collect a debt.
A number of states have tolled the statutes of limitations on legal actions in response to COVID-19. The Iowa Supreme Court announced a toll on statutes of limitations in a March 17 order regarding court procedures. According to a March 23 operations summary from the Iowa Judicial Branch: “The March 17th order is intended to toll the statute of limitations or similar deadline for commencing an action in district court by 48 days. Tolling means you add that amount of time to the statute of limitations. So, for example, if the statute would otherwise run on April 8, 2020, it…
The Maryland Court of Appeals recently held that victims on whose behalf money is collected or property is recovered by the Maryland Consumer Protection Division of the Attorney General's Office (CPD) or federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have no authority, through a private settlement, whether or not approved by a court, to preclude the CPD or CFPB from pursuing their own remedies.
The “Minnesota Consumer Data Privacy Act,” HF 3936, is a walleye-size privacy bill that significantly expands on the California Consumer Privacy Act. Unlike the CCPA, it does not include a dollar threshold for applicability.