Rhode Island — RI Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (ch. 19-14.9) + SOL

Authority

Rhode Island regulates collection conduct through the Rhode Island Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, R.I. Gen. Laws ch. 19-14.9 (P.L. 2007, ch. 427; amended P.L. 2023, ch. 395, art. 2) — a near-verbatim adoption of the federal FDCPA plus a registration gate administered by the Department of Business Regulation (DBR). Enforcement is by private action (§ 19-14.9-13(2)), by registration revocation, and by criminal penalty for unregistered collection (§ 19-14.9-13(1)).

Limitations periods live in Title 9, ch. 1 — § 9-1-13(a) is a ten-year catch-all, the longest general civil period in the country. Negotiable instruments run six years under the UCC (§ 6A-3-118), and contracts for the sale of goods run four (§ 6A-2-725(1)).

Medical debt is separately regulated: ch. 6-60 (Medical Debt Reporting, eff. 2025-01-01), § 6-26-11 (interest cap, eff. 2025-06-26), and the P.L. 2025 ch. 300/301 amendments to §§ 9-25-3, 10-5-2, 10-5-7 and 10-5-8 (execution/attachment/garnishment bans, eff. 2026-01-01).

Verification note

• webserver.rilegislature.gov fetches cleanly to an ordinary browser request; no WAF, no JS shell. Statute path pattern: /Statutes/TITLE<T>/<chapter>/<section>.htm, chapter index at /Statutes/TITLE<T>/<chapter>/INDEX.htm. Some Title 6A pages are cp1252, not UTF-8 — decode accordingly or the section sign renders as ?.
• CURRENCY TRAP — versioned sections live at a doubled filename. When a section has both a current and a future/superseded version, the plain URL (9-25-3.htm) serves only the older version, with no marker that a newer one exists. The page carrying both versions is 9-25-3_9-25-3.htm (pattern: <cite>_<cite>.htm). The chapter INDEX is the tell — it prints [Effective until <date>.]…[Effective <date>.] and its href points at the doubled name. Fetching the plain URL for §§ 9-25-3, 10-5-7 and 10-5-8 returns pre-2026 text that omits the medical-debt bans entirely. Always read the chapter INDEX first and follow its href.
• There is no full-text search of the RI General Laws. webserver.rilegislature.gov/Search/ redirects to /BillSearch (bills only). Negatives on the statutes must be proved by enumerating a chapter's INDEX and fetching every section — the method used below.
• Enacted session laws are server-rendered HTML at webserver.rilegislature.gov/PublicLaws/law<yy>/law<yy><chapter>.htm (e.g. law25300.htm), showing struck/inserted text. Bill PDFs at /BillText/BillText<yy>/{Senate,House}Text<yy>/.
• RI Judiciary case law is searchable via an open SharePoint REST endpoint, which indexes the full text of the opinion and decision PDFs: https://www.courts.ri.gov/_api/search/query?querytext='<terms>'&rowlimit=<n> with Accept: application/json;odata=verbose. Caveat: it is AND-over-terms and quoted phrases return zero hits — use bare keywords, never "exact phrases".
• api.govinfo.gov was rate-limited (HTTP 429) throughout this pass; no federal-court cross-check was available. rules.sos.ri.gov has no /search route (404); the RICR is browsable only by /organizations/subchapter/<agency>-<title>-<sub>.

Operative text

Scope — § 19-14.9-3 definitions (original creditors are OUT; medical debt is the exception)

(4) "Debt" means any obligation or alleged obligation of a consumer to pay money arising out of a transaction in which the money, property, insurance, or services that are the subject of the transaction are primarily for personal, family, or household purposes, whether or not the obligation has been reduced to judgment. (5) "Debt collector" means any person who uses an instrumentality of interstate commerce or the mails in any business the principal purpose of which is the collection of any debts, or who regularly collects or attempts to collect, directly or indirectly, debts owed or due or asserted to be owed or due another. Notwithstanding the exclusion provided by clause (f) below, debt collector shall include a creditor who, in the process of collecting his/her own debt, uses any name other than his/her own which would indicate that a third person is collecting or attempting to collect the debt. … Debt collector shall not include: (a) An officer or employee of a creditor while, in the name of the creditor, collecting debts for the creditor; … (f) A person collecting or attempting to collect a debt owed or due or asserted to be owed or due another to the extent the activity: … (ii) Concerns a debt that was originated by the person; (iii) Concerns a debt that was not in default at the time it was obtained by the person or in connection with a debt secured by a mortgage, when first serviced by the person; … (g) Attorneys-at-law collecting a debt on behalf of a client; — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-3 (P.L. 2007, ch. 427, § 1; P.L. 2023, ch. 395, art. 2, § 6, eff. June 27, 2023)

Note § 19-14.9-3(5)(g): Rhode Island exempts attorneys entirely, which the federal FDCPA does not (15 U.S.C. § 1692a(6) reaches debt-collecting lawyers). A law firm collecting in RI is outside ch. 19-14.9 but still inside the FDCPA.

Entry gate — § 19-14.9-12 (registration, not a license; $750/yr; no bond)

(1) After July 1, 2008, no person shall engage within this state in the business of a debt collector, or engage in soliciting the right to collect or receive payment for another of an account, bill, or other indebtedness, or advertise for or solicit in print the right to collect or receive payment for another of an account, bill, or other indebtedness, without first registering with the director, or the director's designee. (2) The application for registration shall be in writing; shall contain information as the director may determine; and shall be accompanied by a registration fee of seven hundred fifty dollars ($750). (3) The registration shall be for a period of one year. … (4) No person registered to act within this state as a debt collector shall do so under any other name or at any other place of business than that named in the registration. The registration shall be for a single location but may, with notification to the director, be moved to a different location. A registration shall not be transferable or assignable. (5) This section shall not apply: (a) To the servicer of a debt by a mortgage; (b) To any debt collector located out of this state, provided that the debt collector: (i) Is collecting debts on behalf of an out-of-state creditor for a debt that was incurred out of state; and (ii) Only collects debts in this state using interstate communication methods, including telephone, facsimile, or mail; or (c) To any regulated institution as defined under § 19-1-1, national banking association, federal savings bank, federal savings and loan association, federal credit union, or any bank, trust company, savings bank, savings and loan association, or credit union organized under the laws of this state, or any other state of the United States, or any subsidiary of the above; but except as provided herein, this section shall apply to a subsidiary or affiliate, as defined by the director, of an exempted entity and of a bank holding company established in accordance with state or federal law. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-12 (P.L. 2007, ch. 427, § 1; P.L. 2014, ch. 106/125, § 5; P.L. 2019, ch. 88, art. 5, § 2; P.L. 2023, ch. 395, art. 2, § 8, eff. June 27, 2023)

Regulator: § 19-14.9-3(6)–(7) — "'Department' means the department of business regulation"; "'Director' means the director of the department of business regulation, or the director's designee." DBR takes the application through NMLS: its Banking Division "All Other Licensees" page lists "Debt Collector Registration" among the types for which "Applicants for any of the following must go through the Nationwide Multistate Licensing System (NMLS)" (dbr.ri.gov, read 2026-08-12).

Verified negatives on the gate. All 14 sections of ch. 19-14.9 were fetched and searched: there is no bond, no minimum net worth, and no examination requirement in the chapter. Debt collection is also not one of the licensed activities in § 19-14-2(a) (which lists lending, loan brokering, currency transmission, check cashing, debt-management services, mortgage-loan originating, and third-party loan servicing) — so ch. 19-14's licensing apparatus, including the § 19-14-6 bond, does not attach to a debt-collector registrant.

Penalty for unregistered collection — § 19-14.9-13(1)

(1) Any person who engages in the business of a debt collector without a registration as required by § 19-14.9-12, shall, upon conviction, be fined not more than two thousand dollars ($2,000) or imprisoned not more than one year, or both. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-13(1)

Call-time window — § 19-14.9-5(1)(a) (federal 8am–9pm, no stricter)

(1) Without the prior consent of the consumer given directly to the debt collector or the express permission of a court of competent jurisdiction, a debt collector may not communicate with a consumer in connection with the collection of any debt: (a) At any unusual time or place or a time or place known or which should be known to be inconvenient to the consumer. In the absence of knowledge of circumstances to the contrary, a debt collector shall assume that the convenient time for communicating with a consumer is after 8 o'clock A.M. and before 9 o'clock P.M. local time at the consumer's location; — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-5(1)(a)

§ 19-14.9-5(3) carries the FDCPA cease-communication rule verbatim, and § 19-14.9-5(5) extends "consumer" to "the consumer's spouse, parent (if the consumer is a minor), guardian, executor, or administrator."

Call frequency — § 19-14.9-6 (no numeric cap; intent standard only)

A debt collector may not engage in any conduct the natural consequence of which is to harass, oppress, or abuse any person in connection with the collection of a debt. Such conduct shall include, but not be limited to: … (d) Causing a telephone to ring or engaging any person in telephone conversation repeatedly or continuously with intent to annoy, abuse, or harass any person at the called number; or (e) Except as provided in § 19-14.9-4, placing telephone calls without meaningful disclosure of the caller's identity. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-6

Verified negative: every section of ch. 19-14.9 was searched for a numeric call limit — none exists. Reg F's 7-in-7 presumption (12 CFR 1006.14(b)(2)(i)) is the operative frequency limit in Rhode Island.

Prohibited practices — RI's deltas from the federal text

Most of §§ 19-14.9-7 and -8 tracks 15 U.S.C. §§ 1692e and 1692f. Three provisions are Rhode-Island-specific and drive product behavior:

(p) Communicating by telephone without disclosure of the name of the debt collector and without disclosure of the personal name of the individual making such communication; provided, however, that any such individual utilizing an alias shall use only one such alias at all times and provided that a mechanism is established by the debt collector to identify the person using such alias; the debt collector shall submit a list of all such aliases and the persons using same to the director; — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-7(p) (emphasis added)

(a) Collecting any amount (including any interest, fee, charge, or expense incidental to the principal obligation) unless such amount is expressly authorized by the agreement creating the debt or permitted by law; … (k) Reporting to a consumer reporting agency on its transactions or experiences with a consumer in the debt collector's name. However, a debt collector may, with the express written authorization of the creditor, report to a consumer reporting agency in the creditor's name. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-8(a), (k)

§ 19-14.9-8(g) also bans postcard communications and (h) bans any language or symbol on the envelope other than the collector's address (a business name is allowed only if it does not indicate the collection business).

Validation — § 19-14.9-9 (pre-Reg F FDCPA shape: 5 days / 30 days)

(1) Within five (5) days after the initial communication with a consumer in connection with the collection of any debt, a debt collector shall, unless the following information is contained in the initial communication, or the consumer has paid the debt, send the consumer a written notice containing: (a) The amount of the debt; (b) The name of the creditor to whom the debt is owed; (c) A statement that unless the consumer, within thirty (30) days after receipt of the notice, disputes that validity of the debt, or any portion thereof, the debt will be assumed to be valid by the debt collector; … (2) If the consumer notifies the debt collector in writing within the thirty-day (30) period described in subsection (1)(d) that the debt, or any portion thereof, is disputed, or that the consumer requests the name and address of the original creditor, the debt collector shall cease collection of the debt, or any disputed portion thereof, until the debt collector obtains verification … — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-9

Private right of action and damages — § 19-14.9-13(2)–(6)

(2) Any debt collector who fails to comply with the provisions of §§ 19-14.9-4 — 19-14.9-11 with respect to a consumer may be subject to revocation of registration and shall be civilly liable to such consumer in an amount equal to the sum of: (a) Any actual damages …; (b) In the case of any action by an individual, such additional damages as the court may allow, but not to exceed one thousand dollars ($1,000); (c) In the case of a class action: … (ii) Such amount as the court may allow for all other class members, without regard to a minimum individual recovery, not to exceed five hundred thousand dollars ($500,000) or one percent of the net worth of the debt collector, whichever is the lesser; (d) … the costs of the action, together with such reasonable attorney fees … (4) A debt collector may not be held liable in any action brought pursuant to the provisions of this chapter if: (a) The debt collector shows by a preponderance of evidence that the violation was not intentional or negligent and the violation resulted from a bona fide error …; or (b) Within fifteen (15) days, either after discovering a violation that is able to be cured, or after the receipt of a written notice of such violation, the debt collector notifies the consumer of the violation, and makes whatever adjustments or corrections are necessary to cure the violation with respect to the consumer. (5) An action to enforce any liability created by the provisions of this article may be brought in any court of competent jurisdiction within one year from the date on which the violation occurs. (6) The policy of this state is not to award double damages under this article and the federal "Fair Debt Collection Practices Act" (15 U.S.C. § 1692 et seq.). No damages under this section shall be recovered if damages are recovered for a like provision of said federal act. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 19-14.9-13 (emphasis added)

The § 19-14.9-13(4)(b) 15-day cure window has no federal analog and is a genuine defense — it is an affirmative safe harbor, not a notice-and-opportunity precondition on the consumer.

Deceptive Trade Practices Act — the regulated-activity exemption

(a) Nothing in this chapter shall apply to actions or transactions permitted under laws administered by the department of business regulation or other regulatory body or officer acting under statutory authority of this state or the United States. (b) For actions brought by the attorney general, the exemption in subsection (a) applies only if the person claiming the exemption shows that: (1) The person's business activities are subject to regulation by a state or federal agency; and (2) The activity or conduct is in compliance with orders, including insurance bulletins, or rules of, or a statute administered by, a federal or state government agency. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-13.1-4 (P.L. 1968, ch. 12, § 1; P.L. 2021, ch. 206/329, § 1)

Statute of limitations

The catch-all — § 9-1-13(a): ten years

(a) Except as otherwise specially provided, all civil actions shall be commenced within ten (10) years next after the cause of action shall accrue, and not after. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-13(a) (P.L. 1965, ch. 55, § 6; P.L. 1978, ch. 299, § 2)

(§ 9-1-13(b), the product-liability subsection, is marked "[Ruled unconstitutional, see case notes]" on the official page and is irrelevant to debt.)

There is no separate Rhode Island period for written contracts, oral contracts, open accounts, book accounts, or accounts stated. All of them fall into § 9-1-13(a)'s ten years. Method for this negative: every section of ch. 9-1 was enumerated from the official chapter INDEX and fetched (64 files) — the only limitations sections are § 9-1-13 (general/products), § 9-1-14 and its .1–.4 variants (words spoken, personal injury, malpractice), § 9-1-17 (sealed instruments and judgments), and the special-subject sections at §§ 9-1-25, 9-1-29, 9-1-38. The Legislature's own cross-check, § 9-1-36, lists no contract, account, or debt entry other than the catch-all:

The following compilation of statutes of limitation for civil actions is set forth as an aid to the public and is not intended to replace the specific statutes referred to herein. The omission of any statute of limitation from this list shall in no way affect the validity of that statute. … 6A-2-725(1) | Breach of contracts for sale of goods | 4 years … 9-1-13(a) | All civil actions not otherwise limited | 10 years … 9-1-17 | Contracts or liabilities under seal; judgment; decrees | 20 years — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-36 (P.L. 1982, ch. 388, § 2; P.L. 1988, ch. 392, § 1; P.L. 1989, ch. 542, § 5)

Sealed instruments and judgments — § 9-1-17: twenty years

The following actions shall be commenced and sued within twenty (20) years next after the cause of action shall accrue and not after: actions on contracts or liabilities under seal; and actions on judgments or decrees of any court of record of the United States, or of any state. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-17

Goods — § 6A-2-725(1): four years

(1) An action for breach of any contract for sale must be commenced within four (4) years after the cause of action has accrued. By the original agreement the parties may reduce the period of limitation to not less than one year but may not extend it. (2) A cause of action accrues when the breach occurs, regardless of the aggrieved party's lack of knowledge of the breach. … — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6A-2-725

Negotiable notes — § 6A-3-118: six years (SHORTER than the general period)

(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 six years after the due date or dates stated in the note or, if a due date is accelerated, within six years after the accelerated due date. (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 six 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 … (g) Unless governed by other law regarding claims for indemnity or contribution, an action (i) for conversion of an instrument, for money had and received, or like action based on conversion, (ii) for breach of warranty, or (iii) to enforce an obligation, duty, or right arising under this chapter and not governed by this section must be commenced within three years after the cause of action accrues. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6A-3-118 (P.L. 2000, ch. 238, § 3; P.L. 2000, ch. 421, § 3)

Rhode Island adopted Revised UCC Article 3 in 2000, twenty years after § 9-1-36's enumeration was compiled — which is why the enumeration does not list § 6A-3-118. Because § 9-1-13(a) yields to anything "otherwise specially provided," a negotiable note runs six years, not ten. This is a reverse collapse: RI is one of the few states where the UCC note period is markedly shorter than the general contract period.

But the fallback is real. § 6A-3-118 governs only instruments that are negotiable under Article 3. A non-negotiable note falls back to § 9-1-13(a)'s ten years, and the RI Superior Court has applied exactly that:

However, that case was dismissed by this Court on August 27, 2012, as being barred by the relevant ten-year statute of limitations for recovering on a promissory note. See G.L. 1956 § 9-1-13. — Wyss v. Wyss, C.A. No. WC-2013-0024, at 3 (R.I. Super. June 26, 2014) (K. Rodgers, J.) (courts.ri.gov/Decisions/13-0024.pdf)

(Interpretation, not holding: the quoted passage recites the disposition of a companion case and does not analyze negotiability. It is evidence that RI courts will apply § 9-1-13 to a note when Article 3 is not invoked — not authority that § 6A-3-118 is inapplicable to negotiable paper. Treat the six-vs-ten question on any specific note as attorney-review.)

Commencement, accrual and tolling

An action is commenced for purposes of the statute of limitations when the complaint is either filed with the court, deposited in the mail addressed to the clerk, or delivered to an officer for service. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-12 (P.L. 1965, ch. 55, § 6; P.L. 1966, ch. 1, § 4)

If any person against whom there is or shall be cause for any action, as enumerated in this chapter, in favor of a resident of the state, shall at the time the cause accrues be outside the limits of the state, or being within the state at the time the cause accrues shall go out of the state before the action is barred by the provisions of this chapter, and does not have or leave property or estate in the state that can be attached by process of law, then the person entitled to the action may commence the action, within the time before limited, after the person has returned into the state in such a manner that an action may, with reasonable diligence, be commenced against him or her by the person entitled to the action; provided, however, that no action shall be brought by any person upon a cause of action accruing outside this state which was barred by limitation or otherwise in the state, territory, or country in which the cause of action arose while he or she resided in the state. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-18 (emphasis added — this proviso is Rhode Island's borrowing statute)

If any person at the time any such cause of action shall accrue to him or her shall be under the age of eighteen (18) years, or of unsound mind, or beyond the limits of the United States, the person may bring the cause of action, within the time limited under this chapter, after the impediment is removed. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-19

If any person, liable to an action by another, shall fraudulently, by actual misrepresentation, conceal from him or her the existence of the cause of action, the cause of action shall be deemed to accrue against the person so liable at the time when the person entitled to sue thereon shall first discover its existence. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-20

There is no statutory accrual anchor for accounts (no "last item of the account" or "last payment" rule anywhere in ch. 9-1). Accrual on a RI open account is common law.

Revival — NO Rhode Island statute; the common-law rule is UNVERIFIED

Verified negative. All 64 pages of ch. 9-1 were fetched and text-searched for acknowledg*, new promise, part payment, partial payment, and reviv*. Zero hits on any revival concept — the only matches for "promise" are § 9-1-1 (a note is a promise to pay), § 9-1-4 (statute of frauds), and § 9-1-5 (landlord's promise). §§ 9-1-18 through 9-1-24 cover absence, disability, concealment, death of a party, extension after termination of an action, joinder of counts and special provisions — none touches acknowledgment or payment. § 9-1-36's official enumeration lists no revival provision. There is likewise no statutory anti-revival rule (no RI analog to N.Y. CPLR 214-i or Tex. Fin. Code § 392.307(d)).

UNVERIFIED — do not model RI revival. Rhode Island's acknowledgment / new-promise doctrine is common law, and no controlling text for it could be located in an official source during this pass:

• No statute (proved above).
• No decision in the RI Judiciary's own full-text corpus (courts.ri.gov Opinions and Decisions, searched via the SharePoint REST endpoint documented in the verification note). Keyword combinations — new promise revive barred debt, part payment revive statute limitations debt, revive limitations debt, partial payment tolled statute limitations note — returned zero or only irrelevant hits. The RI authority on this doctrine is 19th/early-20th-century Supreme Court case law that predates the online corpus.
• No federal cross-check: api.govinfo.gov was rate-limited (429) for the duration.

Rhode Island revival is manual-verification-only. Attorney review before any product behavior re-ages a Rhode Island claim. Note that with a ten-year clock the practical exposure is small, but the direction of the unknown is unfavorable: if RI follows the majority common-law rule, a post-expiry payment or written acknowledgment could restart a ten-year period.

Time-barred debt — no suit bar, no disclosure

Verified negative. No section of ch. 19-14.9 contains "time-barred" or any limitation-period disclosure, and there is no Rhode Island debt-buyer statute (Title 19's chapter index has no debt-buyer chapter; Title 6's has none either). Rhode Island imposes no bar on filing suit on a time-barred debt, no scripted time-barred-debt notice, and no debt-buyer documentation requirement. Reg F § 1006.26 is the only applicable rule.

Medical debt — Rhode Island's real regulatory delta

Credit reporting: flat ban — ch. 6-60 (eff. 2025-01-01)

(4) "Medical debt" means an obligation of a consumer to pay an amount for the receipt of healthcare services as defined by § 27-81-3, products, or devices, owed to a healthcare facility or a healthcare professional as defined by § 27-81-3. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-60-1(4) (P.L. 2024, ch. 224/225, § 1, eff. January 1, 2025)

A healthcare provider as defined in § 27-81-3, or a healthcare facility authorized or licensed under chapter 17 of title 23, or an emergency medical transportation service certified under chapter 4.1 of title 23, shall not furnish information regarding any portion of a medical debt to a consumer reporting agency. In any contract entered into with a collection entity or debt collector for the purchase or collection of medical debt, there shall be included a provision that prohibits the reporting of any portion of medical debt to a consumer reporting agency. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-60-2 (emphasis added)

No credit reporting agency shall acquire, record, or report any medical debt, in any manner. A credit reporting agency shall not make a consumer report containing any adverse information that the agency knows or should know is related to medical debt of a consumer. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-60-3

Mandatory verbatim disclosure and the 60-day appeal freeze — § 6-60-4

(a) A creditor, debt collector, or collection agency shall not use any false, deceptive, or misleading information or means when attempting to collect a medical debt or in an attempt to obtain information about a consumer in relation to collection of a medical debt by making a false, deceptive, or misleading representation that the medical debt will be included in a consumer credit report or factored into a credit score. (b) Any correspondence from a creditor, debt collector, or collection agency to a consumer shall include the following language: "The State of Rhode Island general laws prohibit credit bureaus from reporting medical debt or factoring medical debt into a credit score." (c) No creditor or debt collector that knows or should have known about an internal review, external review, or other appeal of a health insurance decision that is pending within sixty (60) days of the consumer's receipt of the financial statement shall: (1) Provide information relative to unpaid charges for healthcare services to a consumer reporting agency; (2) Communicate with the consumer regarding the unpaid charges for healthcare services for the purpose of seeking to collect the charges; or (3) Initiate a lawsuit or arbitration proceeding against the consumer relative to unpaid charges for healthcare services. (d) If a medical debt has already been reported to a consumer reporting agency and the creditor or debt collector who reported the information learns of an internal review, external review, or other appeal of a health insurance decision that is pending within sixty (60) days of the consumer's receipt of the financial statement, such creditor or collector shall instruct the consumer reporting agency to delete the information about the debt. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-60-4 (emphasis added)

Any consumer reporting agency or debt collector that fails to comply with the requirements imposed under this chapter, and that does not achieve compliance within thirty (30) days of being notified by the consumer of its noncompliance, is liable to that consumer in an amount equal to the sum of ten dollars ($10.00) per day for each day of noncompliance. If the noncompliance persists beyond the thirty (30) days following the consumer's notification, the consumer may notify the attorney general, who may bring an action against the offending person or entity to enjoin that person or entity from continuing the violation and for any other relief that the court deems appropriate. … — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-60-5

Interest cap — § 6-26-11 (eff. 2025-06-26)

(b) Interest on medical debt shall be limited to the rate of interest equal to the weekly average one-year constant maturity Treasury yield, but not less than one and a half percent per annum (1.5% p.a.) nor more than four percent per annum (4% p.a.) as published by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, for the calendar week preceding the date when the consumer was first provided with a bill. (c) The rate of interest provided in subsection (b) of this section shall only be applied to new debt incurred after June 26, 2025. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-26-11 (P.L. 2025, ch. 302, § 1; P.L. 2025, ch. 303, § 1, eff. June 26, 2025)

Judgment enforcement bans — P.L. 2025 ch. 300/301, effective 2026-01-01

Executions, original or alias, may be issued by any court at any time within six (6) years from the rendition of the judgment originally or from the return day of the last execution; provided that, no execution shall be filed against a defendant's principal residence for a judgment in any action where the plaintiff's claim against the defendant was based on medical debt. For purpose of this section, "medical debt" shall have the same meaning as defined in § 6-60-1. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 9-25-3 [Effective January 1, 2026] (P.L. 2025, ch. 300, § 2; ch. 301, § 2) (emphasis added)

(2) The defendant's real estate; provided that, no attachment shall be filed against a defendant's principal residence for a judgment in any action where the plaintiff's claim against the defendant was based on medical debt. … (b) A violation of the prohibition provided in subsection (a)(2) of this section shall constitute slander of title. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 10-5-7 [Effective January 1, 2026] (emphasis added)

(a) Any writ of attachment, served as a writ of garnishment … shall be effective to attach so much only of such personal estate consisting of the salary or wages … as is in excess of the amount of the defendant's salary or wages exempt by law from attachment except, no garnishment of salary or wages shall issue against a defendant for a judgment in all actions where the plaintiff's claim against the defendant was based on medical debt. For the purpose of this section, "medical debt" shall have the same meaning as defined in § 6-60-1. … — R.I. Gen. Laws § 10-5-8 [Effective January 1, 2026] (emphasis added)

§ 10-5-2 received the same principal-residence proviso. The companion DTPA amendment carved medical debt out of the "credit report" definition:

(E) Any report containing information solely as to transactions or experiences between the consumer and a healthcare provider for medical debt. (3) "Medical debt" means an obligation of a consumer to pay an amount for the receipt of healthcare services as defined by § 27-81-3, products, or devices, owed to a healthcare facility or a healthcare professional as defined by §§ 27-81-3 and 6-60-1. Medicaid reimbursement and child support orders are excluded from this definition. — R.I. Gen. Laws § 6-13.1-20(2)(ii)(E), (3) [Effective January 1, 2026] (P.L. 2025, ch. 300, § 1; ch. 301, § 1) (emphasis added)

Plain English

Interpretation — the quotes above win on any conflict.

• The entry gate is a registration, not a license, and not a bond. Register with DBR through NMLS, $750 a year, one registration per location, non-transferable. Collecting without it is a crime: up to $2,000 and/or a year.
• The out-of-state exemption is unusually generous. § 19-14.9-12(5)(b) exempts an out-of-state collector that collects for an out-of-state creditor on a debt incurred out of state using only phone, fax or mail. All three prongs must hold — an in-state creditor, an RI-incurred debt, or an in-state office defeats it. (Email/SMS are not in the listed "interstate communication methods"; whether they qualify is untested — treat as attorney-review before relying on the exemption for a digital-first channel.)
• Original creditors are OUT of ch. 19-14.9 (unlike Texas), except when they collect under a name suggesting a third party. Attorneys are out too — a broader carve-out than the FDCPA's. But medical debt is different: ch. 6-60 binds "a creditor, debt collector, or collection agency" alike, so a hospital's own business office is fully inside the medical-debt rules.
• No frequency cap and no call window beyond federal. Reg F 7-in-7 and 8am–9pm govern.
• SOL is ten years for essentially everything — written, oral, open account, credit card. Six years for a negotiable note, four for a contract for the sale of goods, twenty for a sealed instrument or a judgment.
• No time-barred-debt regime at all — no suit bar, no disclosure, no anti-revival statute. And no revival statute either: whether a payment restarts a RI clock is an open, unbriefed question. Do not re-age.
• Medical debt is where RI actually bites. A flat credit-reporting ban, a mandated verbatim sentence in correspondence, a 60-day insurance-appeal freeze on reporting and contact and suit, an interest cap of 1.5–4%, and — since 2026-01-01 — no wage garnishment and no execution or attachment against a principal residence on a medical-debt judgment.

Traps / edge cases

• § 6-60-4(b) is drafted broadly enough to reach non-medical correspondence. Its text is "Any correspondence from a creditor, debt collector, or collection agency to a consumer shall include the following language," with no limiting phrase such as "regarding medical debt." The section is titled "Medical debt collectors" and sits in the Medical Debt Reporting chapter, which supports the narrow reading — but the operative sentence has no scope limiter, and § 6-60-5 attaches $10/day per-consumer liability. FLAGGED for counsel; the conservative build puts the sentence on every RI consumer letter, not only medical ones.
• The ten-year period is a trap in the other direction. Because § 9-1-13(a) is a catch-all for "all civil actions," anything not specially provided for lands there. Do not assume a short "open account" period exists in RI just because most states have one — it does not.
• Negotiability decides six vs. ten on a note. § 6A-3-118's six years applies only to Article 3 instruments; a non-negotiable note rides § 9-1-13(a)'s ten. This is the reverse of the usual UCC-shortens-nothing pattern seen in most states.
• § 9-1-18's proviso is a borrowing statute hiding in a tolling section. A claim that accrued outside RI and was already barred where it arose while the debtor lived there cannot be brought in RI at all — RI's ten years does not resurrect it.
• § 19-14.9-13(6) bars double recovery with the federal FDCPA; a consumer who recovers under a like federal provision cannot also recover under the state one. Conversely, § 19-14.9-13(5)'s limitations period for state claims is one year, same as the FDCPA's.
• The § 19-14.9-13(4)(b) 15-day cure is a real safe harbor and a strong reason to build a fast RI violation-cure path — the defense is total, not mitigating.
• § 19-14.9-7(p) requires filing alias lists with the DBR director and permits only one alias per collector. Any product that assigns rotating agent pseudonyms breaks RI law.
• § 19-14.9-8(k) forbids furnishing in the collector's own name absent express written creditor authorization — a live constraint on any credit-reporting integration for RI accounts (and moot for medical debt, which cannot be furnished at all).
• RI DTPA is largely closed to consumers here. § 6-13.1-4(a) exempts activities under laws administered by DBR; a registered debt collector is DBR-regulated. Subsection (b)'s narrower compliance-based test applies only to AG actions. (Interpretation — no case cited.)
• The statute server serves stale text at the obvious URL. See the verification note: for §§ 9-25-3, 10-5-2, 10-5-7 and 10-5-8 the plain filename returns pre-2026 text with the medical-debt bans missing. Any re-verification must go through the chapter INDEX.

Related

• ../federal/fdcpa/overview.md · ../federal/fdcpa/validation.md
• ../federal/reg-f/call-frequency.md · ../federal/reg-f/time-barred-debt.md
• ./ma.md · ./ct.md · ./tx.md · ./_matrix.md