Debt Collection During and After the Pandemic: Do Certain US Legislators and Agencies Seek a Debt Collection Ice Age?

As the COVID-19 pandemic rages on, state and federal lawmakers have taken aggressive measures to protect the health and economic security of their citizens, including legislative and regulatory measures limiting or proposing to limit certain debt collection practices. On Friday, May 15, 2020, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 6800, the Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions Act ( the “Heroes Act”). The Heroes Act is a $3 trillion package that revives, among other things, many of the severe debt collection-related restrictions House Democrats have been pushing since the start of the pandemic. In this Legal Update, we analyze the Heroes Act and various other federal and state debt collection-related actions that may offer a glimpse into the future of debt collection as we know it.