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Governments of all sizes and locations are owed money. In the U.S. federal government, citizens and businesses typically owe taxes, fines and fees. Consumers can also owe on federally-backed student loans, while businesses can owe on development loans. Several branches of the U.S. government have robust ARM operations, including the IRS and the Department of Education.
On the state and local level, debts to the government can be too many to enumerate. From court fines and fees to sales tax to late parking tickets. An overwhelming majority of U.S. states, and thousands of municipal governments, have used private debt collectors to help recover their debts.
The Boston Globe’s editorial page today is advocating for legislative restrictions in the relationships between local district attorneys and private debt collection agencies used to recover bad check debt. The core issue is not that DAs use debt collectors, it’s that many step away from the process and outsource their “prosecutorial discretion” to the companies.
The East Pennsboro Township (Pa.) Board of Commissioners is currently accepting bids from debt collection agencies to go after money owed to the town, according to local paper The Sentinel.
Performant Financial Corporation (NASDAQ: PFMT) Tuesday filed a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission with respect to a proposed secondary public offering of 6,500,000 shares of common stock on behalf of certain selling stockholders.
The issue of students and student loan debt will probably be perennial: education costs are increasing; student loans and private loans are almost the norm.
After reporting from several newspapers last year, district attorneys in at least one state are cancelling contracts with private debt collection agencies to pursue bad checks. The moves come as questions are raised about the practices the companies use to recover bad check fees and the right those companies have to operate in the states.
Cutting commissions to the collection agencies who collect on these unpaid debts isn’t the same thing as helping students not fail financially. Collectors are an easy “villain” to point to; however, the issue isn’t really the collectors or the commission. It’s poor financial literacy on the part of students and parents who bite off more debt than they can chew.
The government of the Republic of Ireland is weighing the option of using private debt collection agencies to help recovery money owed to the state.
Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), the national tax collection authority in the United Kingdom, has more than doubled the commissions it paid to private debt collection agencies from 2011 to 2012, according to a report from accounting firm UHY Hacker Young.
Continental Service Group, Inc., d.b.a. ConServe, is pleased to announce that it is planning to create over 100 additional positions over the next 12 months. ConServe’s steadfast growth in the Higher Education, Commercial and Government markets, has created expansion opportunities in Sales, Operations, Client Relations, Human Resources, Compliance, IT and Finance.
Performant Financial Corporation (NASDAQ:PFMT), a leading provider of technology-enabled recovery and related analytics services, today announced that its subsidiary, Performant Recovery, Inc., has been awarded a contract by the United States Department of Education to serve as the Department’s payment recapture contractor.