ACA Association of Credit and Collection Pro : NEWS: Consumer Litigation and Complaints End High in 2015

Consumer litigation cases and complaints to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau grew overall in 2015 and topped some previous annual records tracked by WebRecon in its monthly debt collection litigation and complaint statistics report.

Filings under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and Fair Credit Reporting Act in 2015 reached their highest level since 2007 and topped 2014 results by 45 percent and 53.4 percent, respectively, according to the report.

In 2007, there were only 14 TCPA cases; the number increased significantly to 354 three years later in 2010. The next year, the cases spiked to 840 and to more than 1,000 starting in 2012.

There were 3,710 TCPA case filings in 2015 compared to 2,558 in 2014 and 1,904 in 2013.

FCRA cases increased to 3,751 last year compared to 2,445 in 2014.

In 2015, there were 11,697 Fair Debt Collection Practices Act cases, second only to the high of 12,237 cases in 2011, according to the report. The 2015 FDCPA case filings are a 16.1 percent increase from the 10,071 filings in 2014. 'With even a fraction of 2015's momentum, 2016 could easily set a new record for FDCPA litigation,' according to WebRecon.

WebRecon also reports that, during all of 2015, 35 percent of all consumer litigation plaintiffs had sued at least once before under statutes such as the TCPA, FDCPA and FCRA.

The percentage of lawsuits filed as punitive class actions last year reached 16.6 percent for the FDCPA (1,938 total), 23.6 percent for the TCPA (877 total), and 16 percent for the FCRA (601 total), according to the report.

There were 15,854 total cases for all the consumer statutes in 2015 compared to 5,224 in 2007, with those numbers increasing gradually over the years.

Complaints about debt collectors to the CFPB did reach a record high in 2015, according to WebRecon, but the increase over 2014's complaints was only 1.5 percent, from 39,367 to 39,352. The number of complaints is expected to increase, although not significantly, in the weeks ahead as the final numbers for December come in, according to the report.

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