A joint comment letter on the CFPB’s ANPR on debt collection practices was submitted by the American Bankers Association, the Consumer Bankers Association, and the Financial Services Roundtable. In their letter, the trade groups noted an “unexplained inconsistency” between the number of debt collection complaints publicly reported by Director Cordray and the number of such complaints posted on the CFPB’s Consumer Complaint Database.
The CFPB began taking debt collection complaints in July 2013. According to the trade groups, while Director Cordray publicly stated on January 22, 2014 that the CFPB had received “over 31,000” complaints about debt collection, the number of complaints posted on the database as of February 12, 2014 was 13,546. (When we checked the database on March 28, there were 17,703 debt collection complaints posted.)