Reg F § 1006.26 — Collection of time-barred debts

Authority

12 CFR 1006.26 (Regulation F, Subpart B); enforced by the CFPB. Text verified verbatim against the eCFR (current through 2026-07-01; fetched via the eCFR versioner API). Section source note: [86 FR 5854, Jan. 19, 2021] — this section was added by the second (December 2020 / Jan. 19, 2021) final rule, compliance date Nov. 30, 2021. The current eCFR Supplement I contains no official commentary for § 1006.26 — the section is bare regulatory text.

Operative text

This is the entire section:

(a) Definitions. For purposes of this section: (1) Statute of limitations means the period prescribed by applicable law for bringing a legal action against the consumer to collect a debt. (2) Time-barred debt means a debt for which the applicable statute of limitations has expired. — 12 CFR 1006.26(a)

(b) Legal actions and threats of legal actions prohibited. A debt collector must not bring or threaten to bring a legal action against a consumer to collect a time-barred debt. This paragraph (b) does not apply to proofs of claim filed in connection with a bankruptcy proceeding. — 12 CFR 1006.26(b)

Plain English

Interpretation — if this conflicts with the quotes above, the quotes win.

• If the applicable statute of limitations for suing on the debt has expired, the collector may neither sue nor threaten to sue. Period.
• The prohibition is strict-liability as written. The final text contains no "knows or should know" qualifier — verify against the quote above: it says flatly "must not bring or threaten to bring." The CFPB's 2019 proposal would have prohibited suit only where the collector "knows or should know" the debt is time-barred; the final rule (86 FR 5766, published Jan. 19, 2021, amendatory text at 86 FR 5854) did NOT adopt that knowledge standard. Whether the SOL has run is the collector's problem regardless of what it knew.
• The only carve-out in the text is bankruptcy proofs of claim.
• Collecting a time-barred debt by non-litigation means (calls, letters, credit reporting) is not prohibited by § 1006.26 itself — but misrepresenting the legal status of a time-barred debt violates § 1006.18(b)(2)(i), and several states restrict or condition non-suit collection too.

What federal law does NOT require (verified)

• No federal time-barred-debt disclosure exists in Reg F. The CFPB's supplemental proposal (85 FR 12672, Mar. 3, 2020) would have added required time-barred-debt disclosures at proposed § 1006.26(c) and a model form; those disclosures were not finalized — the current eCFR § 1006.26 contains only paragraphs (a) and (b) quoted above, and no disclosure requirement. Do not build to the proposed disclosure as if it were law.
• What Reg F does instead is permit state-required time-barred-debt disclosures on the validation notice without breaking the model-form safe harbor:

1. In general. Section 1006.34(d)(3)(iv)(B) provides, in relevant part that, if a debt collector is collecting time-barred debt, the debt collector may include on the front of the validation notice any time-barred debt disclosure that is specifically required by, or that provides a safe harbor under, applicable law, provided that applicable law specifies the content of the disclosure. … For purposes of § 1006.34(d)(3)(iv)(B), time-barred debt disclosures may include disclosures about revival of debt collectors' right to bring a legal action to enforce the debt. — Supplement I to Part 1006, comment 34(d)(3)(iv)(B)-1

• States add their own layers — several states require affirmative time-barred-debt disclosures and/or treat partial payment as NOT reviving the SOL. See the state pages: NY, CA, MA, TX, FL.

Traps / edge cases

• Strict liability: relying on "we didn't know the SOL had run" is not a defense under the text of (b). (The FDCPA's general bona fide error defense, 15 U.S.C. 1692k(c), operates separately at the statute level, but the rule text itself has no knowledge element.)
• "Threaten" includes implied threats: dunning language implying suit on a time-barred account risks violating both § 1006.26(b) and § 1006.18.
• Which SOL applies is a state-law question — "the period prescribed by applicable law" (§ 1006.26(a)(1)). Choice of law, debt type (open account vs. written contract vs. promissory note), and venue all move the answer; within one state different debt types carry different periods.
• Revival: in many states a partial payment or written acknowledgment restarts the SOL — meaning a debt can flip between time-barred and not. Some states (e.g. NY, CA for certain debts) have anti-revival rules. The federal definition just points at "applicable law."
• Bankruptcy proofs of claim are exempt by the express second sentence of (b) (aligning with Midland Funding, LLC v. Johnson, 581 U.S. 224 (2017)).
• No commentary exists for this section in Supplement I — there is no federal interpretive gloss to lean on beyond the text.

Related

• overview.md
• validation-notice.md — § 1006.34, incl. where state TBD disclosures go
• ../fdcpa/false-misleading.md — misrepresenting legal status of a time-barred debt
• ../fdcpa/unfair-practices.md
• State layers: NY · CA · MA · TX · FL