Bureau reminder to debt collectors

The CFPB has emailed a reminder concerning a provision of Regulation F implementing the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. Under the regulation, debt collectors who adopt and follow certain procedures can obtain a bona fide error defense from civil liability for unintentional violations of the prohibition against third-party communications when communicating by email or text message. For text message communications, one element of those procedures includes using a “complete and accurate database” to confirm that the consumer’s telephone number has not been re-assigned to another user.

The Rule’s commentary identifies the FCC’s Reassigned Numbers Database as a “complete and accurate database.” The FCC has now published that database, which is available at https://www.reassigned.us/. More information about the Reassigned Numbers Database is available at https://www.fcc.gov/reassigned-numbers-database.