ABSTRACT
In Germany, debt collection practices (Inkassodienstleistungen) are tightly regulated since they are considered a legal service. Nevertheless, the sector is in turmoil. In the last couple of years, debt collection services have expanded their range of services considerably and now directly compete with lawyers, who traditionally have been the only ‘full’ legal professionals recognized by German law. In the wake of this transformation, a shift in the focus of legal service regulation is taking place. The main focus of the law on debt collectors has traditionally lain on protecting the legal system and the creditors (the debt collectors' contractual partners or consumers of legal services as they are referred to in the applicable German statutes). The latest reinforcements of the German legislation, though clearly emphasized the protection of debtors from abusive debt collection practices. The following paper reports critically on the focus points of the German regulation of debt collection services – traditionally and nowadays – before, in a second part, diving deeper into some of the main aspects of this regulation.
