Missouri — no collection-agency statute; ch. 516 SOL + AG unfair-practice rules on time-barred debt

Authority

Missouri has no mini-FDCPA and no collection-agency licensing act. The operative state layer is two things:

1. Statutes of limitation, ch. 516 RSMo — §516.110 (ten years), §516.120 (five years), §516.100 (accrual), §516.320/.330/.340 (revival), §516.160/.190/.200/.280/.350 (accrual, borrowing, tolling, judgments). Negotiable notes are pulled out of ch. 516 entirely by §400.3-118, Missouri's non-uniform UCC 3-118.
2. The Missouri Merchandising Practices Act ("MMPA"), ch. 407 RSMo, plus the Attorney General's rules at 15 CSR 60-8 — which contain two rules written specifically for collections: 15 CSR 60-8.100 (threatening or filing suit on time-barred consumer debt) and 15 CSR 60-8.110 (seeking a reaffirmation of time-barred consumer debt without valuable consideration). Enforced by the AG (§407.100) and, within limits, by private action (§407.025).

The only collection-agency statute in Missouri is §425.300, which grants assignment/real-party-in-interest standing and requires a licensed attorney to file suit. It is not a licensing or conduct provision.

Verification note: statute and regulation text below is direct from revisor.mo.gov and the Secretary of State's current CSR PDFs. courts.mo.gov blocks automated fetching (HTTP 403, "site data scraper … expressly prohibited") and has no Internet Archive capture of the opinion files, so no Missouri appellate opinion was retrieved for this page. Every case-law-dependent classification below is therefore labeled interpretation or UNVERIFIED — see the two flagged items in Traps. Case annotations quoted from the revisor's own section pages are official-site material and are used only as such.

Method for the negative findings. Title XXVII RSMo ("Debtor-Creditor Relations") contains chapters 425–430; the only chapter reaching collection agencies is ch. 425, "Debt Adjusters and Collection Agencies," whose "COLLECTION AGENCIES" subheading contains exactly one section, §425.300. The full chapter 407 table of contents contains no debt-collection-practices subchapter. The Attorney General's CSR division (15 CSR 60) has chapters 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 — none is a debt-collection chapter; the collection rules live inside ch. 8 (Unfair Practices). Hence: no license, no bond, no registration, no state conduct code, no call-frequency cap, no call-time window, no state validation notice, and no mandatory time-barred-debt letter disclosure.

Operative text

Entry gate — the whole of Missouri's collection-agency law

Collection agencies may take assignment of claims in their own name as real parties in interest for the purpose of billing and collection and bringing suit in their own and the claimant's names thereon, provided that no suit authorized by this section may be instituted on behalf of a collection agency in any court unless the collection agency appears by a duly authorized and licensed attorney at law. Upon good cause being shown, a court may sever any actions brought under this section. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §425.300 (L. 1992 S.B. 688 § 5)

There is no licensing, bond, registration, examination, or penalty provision anywhere in the "COLLECTION AGENCIES" portion of ch. 425.

Contrast — debt adjusters (debt settlement / DMP operators) ARE gated. If an agency runs a settlement or debt-management program rather than collecting, a different regime applies:

Each initial license application shall be accompanied by a surety bond in the principal sum in accordance with the following categories: (1) Fifty thousand dollars if the applicant declares that the operation will handle no consumer monies; or (2) One hundred thousand dollars otherwise. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §425.027

Any person who acts or offers to act as a debt adjuster in this state other than under a debt management plan or debt settlement plan is guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction shall be punished as provided by law. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §425.020

A creditor or a creditor's agent is carved out of "debt adjuster" only when its adjusting services are free to the debtor:

The following persons shall not be considered debt adjusters … (4) Any person who is a creditor of the debtor, or an agent of one or more creditors of the debtor, and whose services in adjusting the debtor's debts are rendered without cost to the debtor; — Mo. Rev. Stat. §425.040(4)

Fee caps for debt adjusters: $50 set-up, and monthly the greater of $35 or 8% of the amount distributed (§425.010(6)).

The conduct hook — MMPA §407.020.1 (reaches original creditors)

The act, use or employment by any person of any deception, fraud, false pretense, false promise, misrepresentation, unfair practice or the concealment, suppression, or omission of any material fact in connection with the sale or advertisement of any merchandise in trade or commerce … in or from the state of Missouri, is declared to be an unlawful practice. … Any act, use or employment declared unlawful by this subsection violates this subsection whether committed before, during or after the sale, advertisement or solicitation. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.020.1

(4) "Merchandise", any objects, wares, goods, commodities, intangibles, real estate or services; (5) "Person", any natural person or his legal representative, partnership, firm, for-profit or not-for-profit corporation, whether domestic or foreign, company, foundation, trust, business entity or association, and any agent, employee, salesman, partner, officer, director, member, stockholder, associate, trustee or cestui que trust thereof; (6) "Sale", any sale, lease, offer for sale or lease, or attempt to sell or lease merchandise for cash or on credit; — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.010

Key statutory exemption — MMPA does not reach entities regulated by the named financial regulators unless those directors authorize it:

2. Nothing contained in this section shall apply to: … (2) Any institution, company, or entity that is subject to chartering, licensing, or regulation by the director of the department of commerce and insurance under chapter 354 or chapters 374 to 385, the director of the division of credit unions under chapter 370, or director of the division of finance under chapters 361 to 369, or chapter 371, unless such directors specifically authorize the attorney general to implement the powers of this chapter or such powers are provided to either the attorney general or a private citizen by statute; — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.020.2(2)

The revisor's own annotation to §407.010 records that medical services are merchandise:

(2004) Medical goods and services constitute "merchandise" within definition of section. Freeman Health System v. Wass, 124 S.W.3d 504 (Mo.App.S.D.). — annotation printed on the official §407.010 page

The AG's collections rules — 15 CSR 60-8.100 and 60-8.110 (eff. 2016-06-30)

This is Missouri's time-barred-debt regime. Both rules were filed Nov. 30, 2015 and took effect June 30, 2016, under §§407.020 and 407.145.

(1) It is an unfair practice for any person to threaten to file a civil action, or to file a civil action, for a debt that is primarily for personal, family, or household purposes, if such debt has been— (A) In default for a period of time such that the statute of limitation to file a civil action for collection of the debt has expired; (B) Discharged by a bankruptcy court; (C) Declared void or unenforceable by a court of competent jurisdiction; or (D) Deemed fully satisfied pursuant to an agreement with the consumer and the creditor or its assigns. — 15 CSR 60-8.100, "Threatening to File or Filing Suit on Certain Consumer Debt"

(1) It is unfair practice to seek or obtain without valuable consideration a reaffirmation of an obligation arising out of any debt that is primarily for personal, family, or household purposes, and— (A) For which the statute of limitation to file a civil action for collection of the debt has expired; (B) That has been discharged in bankruptcy; (C) That has been declared void or unenforceable by a court of competent jurisdiction; or (D) That has been deemed fully satisfied pursuant to an agreement with the consumer and the creditor or its assigns. — 15 CSR 60-8.110, "Reaffirmation of Consumer Debt Without Valuable Consideration"

The general standards those rules sit under:

(1) An unfair practice is any practice which— (A) Either—

1. Offends any public policy as it has been established by the Constitution, statutes or common law of this state, or by the Federal Trade Commission, or its interpretive decisions; or
2. Is unethical, oppressive or unscrupulous; and (B) Presents a risk of, or causes, substantial injury to consumers. (2) Proof of deception, fraud, or misrepresentation is not required to prove unfair practices as used in section 407.020.1., RSMo. — 15 CSR 60-8.020, "Unfair Practice in General"

(1) It is an unfair practice for any person in connection with the advertisement or sale of merchandise to engage in any method, use or practice which— (A) Violates state or federal law intended to protect the public; and (B) Presents a risk of, or causes substantial injury to consumers. — 15 CSR 60-8.090, "Illegal Conduct"

(1) Deception is any method, act, use, practice, advertisement or solicitation that has the tendency or capacity to mislead, deceive or cheat, or that tends to create a false impression. (2) Reliance, actual deception, knowledge of deception, intent to mislead or deceive, or any other culpable mental state such as recklessness or negligence, are not elements of deception as used in section 407.020.1., RSMo. — 15 CSR 60-9.020, "Deception in General"

Statute of limitations — ten years (§516.110)

Within ten years: (1) An action upon any writing, whether sealed or unsealed, for the payment of money or property; (2) Actions brought on any covenant of warranty contained in any deed of conveyance of land shall be brought within ten years next after there shall have been a final decision against the title of the covenantor in such deed, and actions on any covenant of seizin contained in any such deed shall be brought within ten years after the cause of such action shall accrue; (3) Actions for relief, not herein otherwise provided for. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.110 (RSMo 1939 § 1013)

The revisor's annotations to §516.110 show how narrowly "writing … for the payment of money" is read:

(1976) Action to recover liquidated damages for breach of a covenant in a lease not to assign or transfer interest in the lease was not based upon a writing for the payment of money but was based on contract and therefore was governed by five-year statute of limitations, section 516.120, and not by section 516.110. Bangert v. Boise Cascade Corp. (C.A.Mo.), 527 F.2d 902. — annotation printed on the official §516.110 page

Statute of limitations — five years (§516.120)

Within five years: (1) All actions upon contracts, obligations or liabilities, express or implied, except those mentioned in section 516.110, and except upon judgments or decrees of a court of record, and except where a different time is herein limited; (2) An action upon a liability created by a statute other than a penalty or forfeiture; (3) An action for trespass on real estate; (4) An action for taking, detaining or injuring any goods or chattels, including actions for the recovery of specific personal property, or for any other injury to the person or rights of another, not arising on contract and not herein otherwise enumerated; (5) An action for relief on the ground of fraud, the cause of action in such case to be deemed not to have accrued until the discovery by the aggrieved party, at any time within ten years, of the facts constituting the fraud. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.120 (RSMo 1939 § 1014)

§516.140 (two years) is confined to libel, slander, injurious falsehood, assault, battery, false imprisonment, criminal conversation, malicious prosecution, §290.140 actions, and FLSA/minimum-wage claims. No debt category currently sits in the two-year bucket.

Notes — §400.3-118 displaces ch. 516 and runs TEN years, not the uniform six

Missouri did not adopt uniform UCC 3-118. The 1997 amendment (A.L. 1997 H.B. 257) raised the note periods to ten years and expressly ousted ch. 516:

(a) Except as provided in subsection (e), an action to enforce the obligation of a party to pay a note payable at a definite time must be commenced within ten years after the due date or dates stated in the note or, if a due date is accelerated, within ten years after the accelerated due date, and the statutes of limitation in chapter 516 shall not apply to this section. (b) Except as provided in subsection (d) or (e), if demand for payment is made to the maker of a note payable on demand, an action to enforce the obligation of a party to pay the note must be commenced within ten years after the demand. If no demand for payment is made to the maker, an action to enforce the note is barred if neither principal nor interest on the note has been paid for a continuous period of 10 years. (c) Except as provided in subsection (d), an action to enforce the obligation of a party to an unaccepted draft to pay the draft must be commenced within three years after dishonor of the draft or 10 years after the date of the draft, whichever period expires first. (d) An action to enforce the obligation of the acceptor of a certified check or the issuer of a teller's check, cashier's check, or traveler's check must be commenced within three years after demand for payment is made to the acceptor or issuer, as the case may be. (e) An action to enforce the obligation of a party to a certificate of deposit to pay the instrument must be commenced within six years after demand for payment is made to the maker, but if the instrument states a due date and the maker is not required to pay before that date, the six-year period begins when a demand for payment is in effect and the due date has passed. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §400.3-118 (L. 1992 S.B. 448, A.L. 1997 H.B. 257; effective 1997-08-28)

The pre-1997 version of §400.3-118 (bid 43911) is shown by the revisor as repealed; the ten-year text is the current effective version.

Accrual — §516.100 (capable-of-ascertainment, last item)

Civil actions, other than those for the recovery of real property, can only be commenced within the periods prescribed in the following sections, after the causes of action shall have accrued; provided, that for the purposes of sections 516.100 to 516.370, the cause of action shall not be deemed to accrue when the wrong is done or the technical breach of contract or duty occurs, but when the damage resulting therefrom is sustained and is capable of ascertainment, and, if more than one item of damage, then the last item, so that all resulting damage may be recovered, and full and complete relief obtained. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.100

The mutual-account accrual rule is not a general open-account rule — it requires reciprocal demands:

In an action brought to recover a balance due on a mutual, open and current account, where there have been reciprocal demands between the parties, the cause of action shall be deemed to have accrued from time of the last item in the account on the adverse side. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.160

Revival — §516.320 (writing required) but §516.340 (payment expressly preserved)

In actions founded on any contract, no acknowledgment or promise hereafter made shall be evidence of a new or continuing contract, whereby to take any case out of the operation of the provisions of sections 516.100 to 516.370, or deprive any party of the benefit thereof, unless such acknowledgment or promise be made or contained by or in some writing subscribed by the party chargeable thereby. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.320, "Actions barred, only revived by written promise"

If there be two or more joint contractors or joint executors or administrators of any contractor, no such joint contractor or executor or administrator shall lose the benefit of the provisions of sections 516.100 to 516.370, so as to be chargeable by reason only of any acknowledgment or promise made or subscribed by any other or others of them. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.330

Nothing contained in sections 516.320 and 516.330 shall alter, take away or lessen the effect of a payment of any principal or interest made by any person. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.340, "Sections 516.320 and 516.330 construed"

Borrowing statute and tolling

Whenever a cause of action has been fully barred by the laws of the state, territory or country in which it originated, said bar shall be a complete defense to any action thereon, brought in any of the courts of this state. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.190

If at any time when any cause of action herein specified accrues against any person who is a resident of this state, and he is absent therefrom, such action may be commenced within the times herein respectively limited, after the return of such person into the state. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.200 (A.L. 2009 H.B. 481)

If any person, by absconding or concealing himself, or by any other improper act, prevent the commencement of an action, such action may be commenced within the time herein limited, after the commencement of such action shall have ceased to be so prevented. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.280

Judgments — ten years, restarted by a recorded payment

Every judgment, order or decree of any court of record … shall be presumed to be paid and satisfied after the expiration of ten years from the date of the original rendition thereof, or if the same has been revived upon personal service duly had upon the defendant or defendants therein, then after ten years from and after such revival, or in case a payment has been made on such judgment, order or decree, and duly entered upon the record thereof, after the expiration of ten years from the last payment so made … such judgment shall be conclusively presumed to be paid, and no execution, order or process shall issue thereon, nor shall any suit be brought, had or maintained thereon for any purpose whatever. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §516.350.1

Fees and interest chargeable in collection

(8) If the contract or promissory note, signed by the borrower, provides for attorney fees, and if it is necessary to bring suit, such attorney fees may not exceed fifteen percent of the amount due and payable under such contract or promissory note, together with any court costs assessed. The attorney fees shall only be applicable where the contract or promissory note is referred for collection to an attorney, and is not handled by a salaried employee of the holder of the contract; — Mo. Rev. Stat. §408.140.1(8)

(3) If the contract so provides, a charge for late payment on each installment or minimum payment in default for a period of not less than fifteen days in an amount not to exceed five percent of each installment due or the minimum payment due or fifteen dollars, whichever is greater, not to exceed fifty dollars. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §408.140.1(3)

Creditors shall be allowed to receive interest at the rate of nine percent per annum, when no other rate is agreed upon, for all moneys after they become due and payable, on written contracts, and on accounts after they become due and demand of payment is made … — Mo. Rev. Stat. §408.020

Wage garnishment cap

The maximum part of the aggregate earnings of any individual for any workweek, after the deduction from those earnings of any amounts required by law to be withheld, which is subjected to garnishment may not exceed (a) twenty-five percentum, or, (b) the amount by which his aggregate earnings for that week … exceed thirty times the federal minimum hourly wage …, or, (c) if the employee is the head of a family and a resident of this state, ten percentum, whichever is less. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §525.030.2(1)

No employer may discharge any employee by reason of the fact that his earnings have been subjected to garnishment or sequestration for any one indebtedness. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §525.030.5

Missouri No-Call does not reach collection calls

(3) "Telephone solicitation", any voice, facsimile, short messaging service (SMS), or multimedia messaging service (MMS), for the purpose of encouraging the purchase or rental of, or investment in, property, goods or services, but does not include communications: (a) To any residential subscriber with that subscriber's prior express invitation or permission; (b) By or on behalf of any person or entity with whom a residential subscriber has had a business contact within the past one hundred eighty days or a current business or personal relationship; … — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.1095(3)

Enforcement and penalties

Any person who purchases or leases merchandise primarily for personal, family or household purposes and thereby suffers an ascertainable loss of money or property, real or personal, as a result of the use or employment by another person of a method, act or practice declared unlawful by section 407.020, may bring a private civil action … to recover actual damages. (2) A person seeking to recover damages shall establish: (a) That the person acted as a reasonable consumer would in light of all circumstances; (b) That the method, act, or practice declared unlawful by section 407.020 would cause a reasonable person to enter into the transaction that resulted in damages; and (c) Individual damages with sufficiently definitive and objective evidence to allow the loss to be calculated with a reasonable degree of certainty. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.025.1 (as amended by A.L. 2020 S.B. 591)

2. The court may, in its discretion: (1) Award punitive damages; (2) Award to the prevailing party attorney's fees, based on the amount of time reasonably expended; and (3) Provide such equitable relief …
3. A cause of action under this section accrues on the date of purchase or lease described in subsection 1 of this section or upon receipt of notice of a method, act, or practice declared unlawful by section 407.020. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.025.2, .4

The court may award to the state a civil penalty of not more than one thousand dollars per violation; except that, if the person who would be liable for such penalty shows, by a preponderance of the evidence, that a violation resulted from a bona fide error notwithstanding the maintenance of procedures reasonably adopted to avoid the error, no civil penalties shall be imposed. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.100.6 (AG action; §407.100.1 injunction, .4 restitution, .8 consent judgments)

3. Any person who willfully and knowingly engages in any act, use, employment or practice declared to be unlawful by this section with the intent to defraud shall be guilty of a class E felony. — Mo. Rev. Stat. §407.020.3

Pending legislation — would cut the SOL hard; NOT enacted

Rep. Marlon Anderson has filed the same bill twice (HB 1509, 2025; HB 2793, 2026). HB 2793 would repeal and re-enact §§516.110, 516.120 and 516.140 to move ordinary consumer debt from ten years to five and credit-card debt to two:

516.110. Within ten years: (1) An action upon any writing, whether sealed or unsealed, for the payment of money or property, except the collection of debt to recover money owed to a creditor by a debtor; … 516.120. Within five years: (1) All actions upon contracts, obligations or liabilities, express or implied, except: (a) Those mentioned in section 516.110[, and except]; (b) Upon judgments or decrees of a court of record[, and except]; (c) Where a different time is herein limited; and (d) The collection of credit card debt; (2) An action upon any writing, whether sealed or unsealed, for the payment of money or property involving the collection of debt to recover money owed to a creditor by a debtor; … 516.140. Within two years: … An action for the collection of credit card debt shall be brought within two years after the cause accrued. — HB 2793, 103rd Gen. Assembly, 2nd Reg. Sess., LR 6188H.01I

Per the bill's own explanation note: bold is proposed new language, and matter in brackets [thus] is existing law proposed to be deleted. The quote above omits the PDF's marginal line numbers.

Status on the official House bill page: proposed effective date 8/28/2026; Last Action: 05/15/2026 — Referred: Emerging Issues(H); Floor Action Incomplete. It died in committee and is not law. The revisor still shows the 1939 text of §§516.110 and 516.120 as the current effective version.

Plain English

Interpretation — the quotes above win on any conflict.

• No license, no bond, no registration to collect in Missouri. The state's entire collection-agency statute is one sentence (§425.300) about taking assignments and about needing a licensed attorney to file suit. Federal law (FDCPA/Reg F) is the operative conduct code; the state overlay is the MMPA plus the AG's unfair-practice rules.
• The MMPA covers original creditors — it applies to "any person," and §407.020.1 expressly reaches conduct "before, during or after the sale." Practically: an original creditor collecting its own consumer paper in Missouri is exposed under the same rules as an agency. The one big carve-out is §407.020.2(2) for institutions chartered/licensed by the Division of Finance, the Division of Credit Unions, or the Department of Commerce and Insurance — banks and similar regulated lenders sit outside the MMPA unless their regulator hands the AG authority.
• Time-barred debt: Missouri bans the suit and effectively bans the revival attempt. 15 CSR 60-8.100 makes threatening or filing suit on out-of-stat consumer debt an unfair practice — the threat alone counts, so a demand letter that mentions legal action on stale paper is a violation. 15 CSR 60-8.110 then makes it an unfair practice to seek a reaffirmation of that debt without giving valuable consideration. Because §516.320 requires a signed writing to revive by acknowledgment, and 60-8.110 makes asking for that writing an unfair practice absent consideration, the practical path to reviving stale Missouri consumer debt by acknowledgment is closed for anything primarily personal/family/household. There is no letter-disclosure requirement in Missouri — no "we will not sue you" notice like Tex. Fin. Code §392.307(e).
• Revival by payment is a different story. §516.340 expressly preserves "the effect of a payment of any principal or interest." Missouri is a payment-matters state: the writing requirement in §516.320 governs acknowledgments and promises only. The statute does not itself say what effect a payment has (restart vs. toll) or whether a payment after expiry resurrects a dead claim — that is common law, and no Missouri opinion could be retrieved for this page. Treat payment-driven re-aging as attorney-review, and do not auto-re-age.
• SOL, working numbers: written instrument that itself promises payment of money = 10 years (§516.110(1)); everything else contractual, express or implied, including oral contracts and ordinary open accounts = 5 years (§516.120(1)); promissory/negotiable notes = 10 years under §400.3-118(a), which by its own terms overrides ch. 516; certificates of deposit = 6 years (§400.3-118(e)); judgments = 10 years, restarted by a payment entered on the record (§516.350.1).
• The 10-vs-5 line is about the document, not the debt. §516.110(1) reaches a writing for the payment of money — the promise to pay must be in the writing. The revisor's own annotation (Bangert) shows a claim that merely arises from a written contract falls to the five-year bucket. So the question for any consumer account is whether the collector actually holds a signed instrument in which the consumer promised to pay money.
• No call-frequency cap and no call-time window. Reg F's 7-in-7 presumption and the 8am–9pm federal window are the operative limits. Missouri's No-Call list is defined around calls "encouraging the purchase or rental of, or investment in, property, goods or services" (§407.1095(3)), which a collection call is not.
• Suit mechanics: a collection agency suing in its own name on an assigned claim must appear by a licensed Missouri attorney (§425.300). Contractual attorney fees are capped at 15% of the amount due and only when the matter is referred to an attorney, not handled by a salaried employee (§408.140.1(8)). Statutory interest where no rate is agreed is 9% — on accounts, only after demand (§408.020).
• Garnishment: 25% of disposable earnings, or 10% if the debtor is head of a family and a Missouri resident (§525.030.2(1)) — the head-of-family floor is unusually protective and is a real recovery-modeling input.

Traps / edge cases

• UNVERIFIED — the credit-card bucket. Placing card debt at five years under §516.120(1) is the standard reading (the card claim is normally pleaded as an account or implied contract, not on a writing that itself promises payment), and the Bangert annotation supports the narrow reading of §516.110(1). But no Missouri appellate holding was retrieved — courts.mo.gov returns 403 to automated fetching and has no archive capture. If a collector produces a signed cardholder agreement containing a promise to pay, a ten-year argument under §516.110(1) is available and Missouri courts have not been checked on it here. Treat MO card accounts in the 5–10 year band as attorney-review; do not ship "5 years, verified" for cards.
  • Corroborating signal, labeled interpretation: HB 2793 drafts the credit-card change as an exception carved out of §516.120(1), which implies its drafters understood card debt to sit in the five-year bucket today. That is legislative drafting, not a holding.
• UNVERIFIED — what a payment actually does. §516.340 preserves payment's effect but never states it. Whether a payment restarts the full period, merely tolls, or can revive an already-expired claim is Missouri common law and was not verifiable from an official source for this page. Note also that a payment made after expiry on a consumer debt runs straight into 15 CSR 60-8.110 if it was obtained as a reaffirmation without valuable consideration.
• §516.160 is not an open-account rule. It applies only to a "mutual, open and current account, where there have been reciprocal demands between the parties." A one-way consumer credit-card or medical account has no reciprocal demands, so last-item accrual under §516.160 does not apply — accrual runs under §516.100 instead. This is the same trap flagged in sd.md and nc.md.
• Notes do not live in ch. 516 at all. §400.3-118(a) says so in terms ("the statutes of limitation in chapter 516 shall not apply to this section"). Anyone reaching for §516.110's ten years for a note gets the right number by the wrong route — and the wrong number for a demand note, an unaccepted draft (3y/10y, whichever is shorter), a certified/teller's/cashier's/traveler's check (3y), or a CD (6y).
• The demand-note dead-file rule. §400.3-118(b): with no demand made, the note is barred if neither principal nor interest has been paid for a continuous ten years. That is a payment-anchored clock and is the one place Missouri statute ties limitations directly to payment activity.
• Borrowing statute cuts one way only. §516.190 imports another state's bar as a complete defense; it does not extend a Missouri period. A claim fully barred where it originated is dead in Missouri even if Missouri's own period is longer — which matters a great deal given Missouri's unusually long ten-year written/note periods.
• Absence tolling is resident-specific. §516.200 tolls only for "any person who is a resident of this state" who is absent. It does not reach a defendant who was never a Missouri resident. §516.280 separately tolls for absconding/concealment.
• Judgment revival needs the payment on the record. §516.350.1 restarts the ten years from "the last payment so made" only where the payment was "duly entered upon the record thereof." An unrecorded payment does not extend the judgment.
• MMPA private action has a purchaser gate. §407.025.1 gives the private right to a person who purchased or leased merchandise primarily for personal/family/household purposes and suffered ascertainable loss; the 2020 amendments (S.B. 591) added reasonable-consumer, materiality, and damages-certainty elements and let courts dismiss as a matter of law. AG enforcement under §407.100 has no such gate, so the AG rules bite even where a private plaintiff would fail.
• Bank/credit-union carve-out. §407.020.2(2) removes Division-of-Finance- and Department-of-Commerce-and-Insurance-regulated institutions from the MMPA. A third-party agency has no such shelter, so the agency can be exposed on a file where its creditor client is not.
• Debt settlement is the licensed activity, not collection. Missouri gates debt adjusters ($50k/$100k bond, §425.027; misdemeanor for operating outside a DMP/DSP, §425.020) while leaving collection agencies ungated. An agency that offers to "settle" consumer debt for a fee is on the licensed side of that line; §425.040(4) only exempts a creditor or creditor's agent whose adjusting services are free to the debtor.
• Not checked: municipal licensing. Whether Kansas City, St. Louis, or other Missouri municipalities impose a local business license or occupational tax on collection agencies was not verified for this page. Absence of a state license is verified; absence of a local one is not claimed.
• Watch item — HB 2793 / HB 1509. The same sponsor has filed the 10y→5y consumer-debt and 2y credit-card bill in two consecutive sessions. It died in committee in 2026 but a third filing in 2027 is plausible. Missouri's ten-year written period is the second-longest in this KB, which makes it a recurring reform target. Re-verify §§516.110, 516.120, 516.140 after 2027-08-28.

Related

• ../federal/fdcpa/overview.md
• ../federal/reg-f/call-frequency.md
• ../federal/reg-f/time-barred-debt.md
• ./tx.md — contrast: TX bars debt-buyer suit by statute and mandates a verbatim notice; MO bars the threat by regulation and mandates nothing.
• ./ok.md · ./sd.md · ./nc.md — other no-license / payment-revival states.
• ./_matrix.md