JPMorgan Chase Close to Settling Long-Running Debt Collection Probe

Two anonymous sources have said that a settlement may be announced within a week between megabank JPMorgan Chase and federal regulators who have been investigating Chase’s credit card debt sales and collection practices for more than a year.

According to two people interviewed by Bloomberg, Chase will settle with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) for “less than $80 million.”

Bloomberg reported that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon met with OCC head Thomas Curry this week to “update the agency on the bank’s activities and its compliance with various regulatory orders.”

The settlement would wrap up an investigation that has been ongoing for quite some time. The probe, made public in March 2012, focuses on credit card portfolio sales and the bank’s other debt collection practices. The main issue is the documentation and information used by credit card issuers to verify account accuracy before filing debt collection lawsuits or selling the accounts to debt buyers.

Federal regulators have reportedly expanded their probe of debt portfolio sale information and data to include other large issuers and several states’ attorneys general have launched their own actions. The attention led to Chase’s decision to pull back many lawsuits in the legal collection channel.