The Most Complained-About Debt Collectors, Ranked (2026)

CL Holdings has the most CFPB complaints on record among debt collectors and debt buyers, at 6,527, followed by Encore Capital Group (4,764) and Portfolio Recovery Associates (4,575). Separately, Rent Recovery Solutions has answered none of its 207 complaints within the CFPB's 15-day window. Snapshot pulled from the CFPB Consumer Complaint Database, current through August 2026.

Read this before the rankings: raw complaint volume mostly tracks company size. A debt buyer servicing millions of purchased accounts will always show more complaints than a five-person local agency, even at a lower complaint rate per account handled. Treat this as "who generates the most complaint volume," not "who is the worst debt collector in America." Full caveat in Methodology.

Most complaints on record, by volume

The 20 debt collectors and debt buyers with the highest total CFPB complaint counts, restricted to companies with at least 100 complaints on record so single-digit noise doesn't crowd the list.

#	Company	Complaints	Most common issue
1	CL Holdings	6,527	Attempts to collect debt not owed
2	Encore Capital Group	4,764	Attempts to collect debt not owed
3	Portfolio Recovery Associates	4,575	Attempts to collect debt not owed
4	Resurgent Capital Services	3,978	Attempts to collect debt not owed
5	Kriya Capital	2,008	Attempts to collect debt not owed
6	CCS Financial Services	1,949	Attempts to collect debt not owed
7	I.C. System	1,762	Attempts to collect debt not owed
8	Caine & Weiner	1,490	Attempts to collect debt not owed
9	National Credit Systems	1,323	Attempts to collect debt not owed
10	Spring Oaks Capital	1,016	Attempts to collect debt not owed
11	Transworld Systems	915	Attempts to collect debt not owed
12	National Credit Adjusters	734	Attempts to collect debt not owed
13	Aldous & Associates	689	Attempts to collect debt not owed
14	Maximus Federal Services	619	Dealing with your lender or servicer
15	Radius Global Solutions	612	Attempts to collect debt not owed
16	TrueAccord	608	Attempts to collect debt not owed
17	Sunrise Credit Services	580	Attempts to collect debt not owed
18	Harris & Harris	540	Attempts to collect debt not owed
19	TS Holdings	489	Attempts to collect debt not owed
20	Rowland Avenue Management Inc. A/KA Columbia Debt Recovery LLC D/b/a Genesis	474	Attempts to collect debt not owed

Least likely to respond: worst CFPB response rates

Companies generally have 15 days to respond once the CFPB routes a complaint. Ranked here by the lowest share of complaints answered in that window, among collectors with at least 50 complaints on record.

Company	Timely response rate	Complaints
Rent Recovery Solutions	0%	207
Waypoint Resource Group	56%	400
Capio Partners	93%	199
Source Receivables Management	97%	203
Bull City Financial Solutions	97%	135
LJ Ross Associates	97%	155
Procollect	98%	336
FAIR Collections & Outsourcing	98%	290
United Collection Bureau	98%	120
Aldous & Associates	99%	689
Ability Recovery Services	99%	319
Rentdebt Automated Collections	99%	160
Contract Callers	99%	123
Synergetic Communication	99%	125
Indebted	99%	150

Raw volume is only part of the picture — see which collector leads on specific issues like false statements or communication tactics, since the leaderboard changes once you look past total volume.

Being contacted by a collector on either list? Start with what to do the first time a collector contacts you and consider sending a debt validation request before anything escalates — see how to file a CFPB complaint if you decide to file one yourself. Look up any specific company's full record, including yours if you're on the other side of a complaint, on the Complaint Lookup tool.

Methodology

Source: the production CFPB Consumer Complaint Database ingestion pipeline backing this site's Complaint Lookup tool, queried directly on August 3, 2026. Companies are restricted to those classified as a debt buyer or collection agency (as opposed to an original creditor, credit bureau, or debt-relief company) in our company directory.

Why this isn't a year-over-year ranking: our ingestion history for this dataset currently covers roughly four months, too short to support an honest year-over-year comparison the way our state-level complaint surge ranking does. This is a point-in-time volume snapshot instead, not a trend.

What this measures and doesn't: a CFPB complaint means a consumer submitted one and the company was given a chance to respond — it isn't a lawsuit, a fine, or a verified finding that the company did anything wrong. Raw volume is not adjusted for company size, number of accounts serviced, or how long a company has operated, so a large national debt buyer will always outrank a small regional agency in absolute terms. The response-rate table is restricted to companies with 50+ complaints so a handful of unanswered complaints can't distort the rate.

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Questions & Answers

Who has the most CFPB complaints among debt collectors?

CL Holdings leads with 6,527 complaints on record, followed by Encore Capital Group and Portfolio Recovery Associates. All three are large, nationally operating debt buyers — raw volume tracks the number of accounts a company handles, not necessarily how badly it behaves per account.