15 USC 1692c: Contact Rules, Cease Letters, and Remedies

Section 1692c of Title 15 of the U.S. Code is the part of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act that controls when, where, and with whom a debt collector may communicate about a debt. It bars contact at inconvenient times or places, requires the collector to go through your attorney once it knows you have one, limits what can be said to third parties, and gives you the right to shut down communication in writing.¹

Inconvenient Times and Places

A debt collector cannot contact you at any time or place it knows or should know is inconvenient. The statute sets a safe harbor: contact between 8:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. in your local time zone is presumed convenient. Anything outside that window is presumed inappropriate.¹

The safe harbor is a floor, not a ceiling on your rights. If you tell a collector that a particular time doesn’t work for you, that puts the collector on notice, and further calls during that specific time become violations even if they fall inside the 8-to-9 window.

Workplace calls have their own rule. A collector cannot contact you at work if it knows or has reason to know your employer prohibits those calls. You don’t need a written company policy. Telling the collector your employer doesn’t allow personal calls is enough. Any further workplace contact after that notice is a violation.¹

Contact When You Have an Attorney

If a debt collector knows you are represented by a lawyer on the debt, and knows or can readily find the lawyer’s name and address, it has to communicate with your attorney rather than with you. This is one of the strongest protections in the section. Once you retain a lawyer and the collector is aware, direct contact should stop.¹

Two narrow exceptions apply. The collector may contact you directly if your attorney does not respond within a reasonable time, or if your attorney consents to direct communication. Regulation F extends the same rule to third-party contacts for location information: once the collector knows you have counsel, location inquiries must go to the attorney as well.²

Talking to Third Parties About Your Debt

Section 1692c cuts off casual chatter about your debt with people around you. A collector generally cannot discuss the debt with anyone other than you, your attorney, a consumer reporting agency (where the law allows), the creditor, the creditor’s attorney, or the collector’s own attorney. Calling your neighbors, coworkers, or extended family to talk about what you owe is off limits. Even hinting at the debt to someone outside that approved list can be a violation.¹

There is one carve-out for finding you. Under 15 USC 1692b, a collector may contact a third party to confirm or correct your address or phone number, but the rules are strict. The collector has to identify themselves by name, cannot state that you owe a debt, cannot use language or symbols suggesting the communication is about debt collection, and generally cannot contact the same person more than once.³

Who Counts as “The Consumer”

For purposes of section 1692c, “consumer” is defined broadly. It includes you, your spouse, your parent (if you are a minor), your guardian, executor, or administrator. That matters because a collector who calls your spouse about your debt is not automatically violating the third-party rule. Your spouse is treated as a consumer under this section.¹

How to Make a Collector Stop Contacting You

Subsection 1692c(c) gives you a shutoff switch. Once you notify a collector in writing that you refuse to pay the debt or that you want communication to cease, the collector must stop contacting you. Only three narrow exceptions remain: the collector may confirm that its collection efforts are ending, notify you that the creditor may invoke specific remedies, or notify you that a specific remedy (such as a lawsuit) is being pursued.¹

The statute says “in writing.” Regulation F reads that to include electronic requests sent through a channel the collector uses to accept communications from consumers, so if a collector emails you, you can send the cease request back through the same email.⁴ For traditional mail, notification is effective when the collector receives the letter. Certified mail with a return receipt is the simplest way to prove delivery if the collector later claims it never arrived.

What a Cease Letter Does Not Do

Telling a collector to stop calling does not make the debt disappear. The collector can still sue you to collect, and the debt can still be reported to credit bureaus. You are cutting off communication, not the underlying obligation. If a collector goes silent after your cease letter, that silence sometimes means a lawsuit is being prepared. Think carefully before sending one, particularly if you are trying to negotiate a settlement or a payment plan.

Restricting a Specific Time, Place, or Channel

You do not have to choose between full contact and total silence. Under Regulation F, you can tell a collector not to contact you at a particular place, and the collector must treat communications to that place as inconvenient. Tell them not to contact you at home, and calls to your home phone and mail to your home address are both off limits. You can also opt out of electronic messages to a specific email address or phone number without blocking every channel.⁴ This lets you steer contact into the channel you prefer while keeping the door open for negotiation.

Who Is Actually Bound by Section 1692c

The rules in 1692c apply only to “debt collectors” as the FDCPA defines that term: third-party collection agencies, law firms doing collection work, and companies that collect debts owed to someone else. A creditor collecting its own debts generally is not covered, with a narrow exception for creditors using a different name that suggests a separate collector is involved.⁵

The Supreme Court held in Henson v. Santander Consumer USA Inc. that a company that buys defaulted debt and then collects it for its own account is not a “debt collector” under the FDCPA. The statute targets third-party agents collecting for a debt owner, not a debt owner collecting for itself.⁶ If a company that bought your debt is collecting on its own behalf, section 1692c may not reach it. Mortgage servicers are treated as debt collectors under the FDCPA only if the loan was already in default when the servicer took it over.⁵

What You Can Recover for a Violation

If a collector violates section 1692c, you can sue in federal or state court. The deadline is one year from the date of the violation, and the clock runs from the violation itself, not from when you discovered it.⁷

A successful FDCPA claim can recover three things. Actual damages compensate real harm, including emotional distress, lost wages from workplace disruption, and other financial losses caused by the violation. Statutory damages of up to $1,000 per lawsuit are available regardless of how many individual violations occurred, with the amount left to the court’s discretion. And the collector pays your attorney’s fees and court costs if you win, which is what makes it realistic for most consumers to find a lawyer to take the case.⁷

In class actions, statutory damages are capped at the lesser of $500,000 or 1% of the collector’s net worth.⁷ The CFPB and state attorneys general can also bring their own enforcement actions against collectors with repeated or egregious violations, separate from anything you file yourself.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1692c – Communication in Connection With Debt Collection
2
eCFR. 12 CFR Part 1006 Subpart B – Rules for FDCPA Debt Collectors
3
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 1692b – Acquisition of Location Information
4
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. 1006.6 Communications in Connection With Debt Collection
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 1692a – Definitions
6
Supreme Court of the United States. Henson v Santander Consumer USA Inc
7
Federal Trade Commission. Fair Debt Collection Practices Act