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Average Credit Card Debt in the U.S. in 2018

Hannah Rounds for MagnifyMoney

Even as household income and employment rates are ticking up in the U.S., credit card balances are at all-time highs. And as the Fed raises rates, credit card rates rise in tandem, meaning consumers could pay billions in extra interest charges.We’ve updated our statistics on credit card debt in America...

DAKCS Announces Patented Payment Technology Licensing
DAKCS Software Systems, Inc. has obtained licensing from payment software hub PDCflow as the only collection software platform officially licensed…
Best and Worst States for Maxing Out Credit Card Debt
According to the Boston Fed, nearly 80% of U.S. adults have a credit card. For many, using credit cards can…
Florida's Economy Hits $1 Trillion GDP Milestone
Florida’s economy hit a new milestone. The state’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) topped $1 trillion, the Florida Chamber Foundation’s chief…

CFPB Settles With National Credit Adjusters
The Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (Bureau) announced a settlement with National Credit Adjusters, LLC (NCA), a privately-held company headquartered…
Robo-Calls Are Getting Worse
Robo-calls ravaged Americans’ smartphones in record numbers last month. But some of the nation’s top businesses — from credit card…
Supreme Court to Decide if FDCPA Applies to Non-Judicial Foreclosure Proceedings
The U.S. Supreme Court announced on June 28 that it had granted a petition for a writ of certiorari to review the judgment of…

CFPB Announces Acting Deputy Director
Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (Bureau) Acting Director Mulvaney today announced he has selected Brian Johnson, who currently serves as…
Americans Paid $40.3 Billion in Credit Card Debt Q1 of 2018
Consumer credit card debt is a bellwether for the overall economy’s health. With that in mind, it may seem to…
White House Backs Off Reshuffling of Student Debt Collection
The Department of Education planned this month to begin reshaping the role of private debt collection firms in handling student…

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Expert Advice from the Top 30 Collection Technology Thought …

Collection Advisor

The accounts receivable industry thrives on innovation of method and technology. This innovation first takes form in the minds of thought leaders. Collection Advisor reached out to industry leaders and colleagues to gather nominations for technology/service providers in the collection industry that strive to work side by side with professionals...

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Keep Electronic Payments Easy - Or Else

Joshua Fluegel

If a consumer has the means to pay an account in full, the last thing a collection professional wants to deal with is a barrier in the transaction medium. But how can a professional find a balance between ease-of-use and secure/compliant data collection? As many still struggle with this conundrum...

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The Changing Landscape of Commercial Collectors

Bob Ingold

I started in this field in 1979, those were known as the glory years. Plenty of business and all creditors wanted was money collected and manual written reports explaining circumstances of the debtor. We would spend Monday through Thursday calling customers and Friday reporting on our portfolio. As for legal...

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Interviewing the Next Top Gun

Sam Eidson

As we all know, hiring employees is an expense. While it’s far more cost effective to retain and develop whom we have, turnover and growth make hiring new employees a necessity. Implementing a formal interview process allows an organization to be selective when searching for their next successful collector. Finding...

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Benefits of Legal Debt Collection on the Nation’s Economy

Michael L. Starzec

The old cliché relating to elected officials is that “all politics are local.” However, as our industry has learned with CFPB consent decrees and regulation by federal litigation, that adage seemed to have lost its meaning. Yet, Mike Mulvaney’s appointment and his recently leaked memo where he stated a legal...

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Who's Who in Compliance 2018

Collection Advisor

Top A/R Pros Drive Compliance and Production Compliance with federal and state regulation has made and destroyed accounts receivable organizations. It is the pillar on which respect in the accounts receivable industry rests. Collection Advisor reached out to leaders in the industry for nominations for accounts receivable professionals who not only...

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Batch or Manual Skip Tracing for You?

Nick Jarman

There's an age old debate on which is the most effective way to skip trace an account. The old school method is to have a collector manually skip trace an account using resources and tools provided by the collection agency. The new school method that has been around for a...

A Play-By-Play of the CFPB SBREFA Hearing

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“Reasonable Belief” Applied to Credit Repair Organizations’ Activities

Debra J. Ciskey

You have seen them by the binful, no doubt, if you are a data furnisher to credit reporting agencies. The nearly identical envelopes containing nearly identical disputes from consumers, written in such archaic language you would think they were written sometime early in the last century. Language such as: “data...

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The Origin of the Cybertracker

Ron Brown

In the process of instructing men and women across the United States and Canada I have found there are three distinct and readily identifiable groups: cybertrackers, skip tracers and skip guessers. In this series I would like to address the traits and recognition flags of each group and look at the...

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Creating a Corporate Legacy

Harry A. Strausser III

The collections industry has a long history. From the beginning of the concept of the extension of credit hundreds of years ago, this is an industry that has grown and changed dramatically. Over the last century, with the exponential growth of credit, the first and third-party debt collection industry has...

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This Will Hurt Your Electronic Payments
Do not do the things described in this article; it's as clear as that. There is no grey area or…
12 Experts Sound Off: What Must Be Done Differently for Multi-Office Collections
The opening of a second collection facility will mean many changes for your agency. But what about your software? Does…
How to Leverage Software in Utility/Municipal Collections
Success in utility and municipal collections requires a tight ship with little to no waste. Fortunately today's software allows this…

How Are You Discouraging Payments
A great deal of work goes into getting a consumer to the payment phase of collecting a debt. The last…

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