This month’s stats from WebRecon were looking at each other in the mirror, it appears. While the number of Fair Debt Collection Practices Act suits were up significantly for the month of June compared with the same month last year, but still down significantly through the first half of the year, the number of Fair Credit Reporting Act and Telephone Consumer Protection Act suits were down for June, but up for the first half of the year.
It is always interesting to see the month-to-month variations that can occur when analyzing litigation trends, and how they can add up during the course of a year.
Through the first half of 2020, the number of FDCPA suits is down 17% compared with last year, while the number of FCRA suits is up 8% and the number of TCPA suits is up 18%. The number of debt collection complaints filed with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is up 8% on a year-over-year basis.
One wonders if the coronavirus pandemic is the reason why the total number of FDCPA, FCRA, and TCPA claims is down 10% through the first half of 2020, compared with the same period of 2019.
While 10% is not an insignificant number, it is probably less of a drop than had been expected in the total number of claims during a pandemic. Plaintiffs and their attorneys continue to be very busy in their efforts to litigate against companies in the credit and collection industry.
Drilling down into the complaints filed by consumers with the CFPB, attempts to collect a debt that is not owed continues to be the most frequently filed issued, accounting for 55% of complaints filed in June.
