Washington Consumer-Debt Defense

Washington Consumer-Debt Defense

The subject-matter bundle for Washington consumer-debt cases. This skill is the container for the substantive law, fact patterns, discovery banks, and case catalog that apply when the matter is debt collection — whether the plaintiff is a debt buyer, a collection law firm, or the original creditor.

NOT LEGAL ADVICE. These notes are drafting aids, not legal advice. Every citation should be verified against the current statute, rule, or opinion before filing. See wa-fact-check and wa-law-references/references/online-sources.md for verification workflow.

How this skill is organized

This is a subject-matter bundle. It sits alongside the procedural skills (wa-first-30-days, wa-discovery, wa-law-references, wa-hearings, etc.) and supplies the debt-specific content those procedural skills delegate to.

wa-consumer-debt/
├── SKILL.md                       ← you are here
└── references/
    ├── chain-of-title.md          UCC Article 9 chain analysis
    ├── ucc-article-9.md           RCW 62A.9A mechanics
    ├── fdcpa.md                   15 U.S.C. § 1692 et seq.
    ├── reg-f.md                   12 C.F.R. Part 1006
    ├── wa-consumer-protection.md  RCW 19.16, RCW 19.86, Hangman Ridge
    ├── wa-statutes-of-limitations.md  RCW 4.16 applied to debt
    ├── fees-consumer-debt.md      FDCPA, CPA, RCW 19.16.450 fee-shifting
    ├── evidence-debt-buyer.md     ER 803/901/1002 applied to debt records
    ├── online-sources-consumer-debt.md  canonical URLs for debt sources
    ├── fact-patterns.md           ten recurring debt-buyer patterns
    ├── key-cases.md               debt-specific case catalog
    ├── recent-decisions.md        recent on-point decisions
    ├── rfp-debt-buyer.md          RFP banks for chain / damages / CPA
    ├── interrogatories-debt-buyer.md
    ├── rfa-debt-buyer.md
    ├── meet-and-confer-debt-buyer.md
    └── examples/                  synthetic sample filings
        ├── README.md
        ├── example-answer.md
        ├── example-motion-to-compel.md
        ├── example-declaration.md
        ├── example-proposed-order.md
        ├── example-meet-and-confer.md
        └── example-certificate-of-service.md

When to use this skill

Invoke wa-consumer-debt when any of the following apply:

• The plaintiff is a debt buyer (Velocity, Portfolio Recovery, LVNV, Midland, Cavalry, Jefferson Capital, CACH, Unifund, Palisades, Resurgent, etc.)
• The complaint alleges default on a credit-card, consumer-loan, medical-debt, or utility account
• The plaintiff relies on a Certificate of Indebtedness, a bill of sale with a redacted schedule, or a specimen cardholder agreement instead of the specific documents
• The user wants to counterclaim under the FDCPA, Reg F, RCW 19.16, or the CPA
• The debt may be time-barred, re-aged, or collected by an unlicensed entity

For non-debt civil matters (landlord-tenant, family, PI, etc.), use the procedural skills directly; this bundle does not apply.

The debt-buyer case — what the plaintiff must prove

A Washington debt-buyer plaintiff has to establish each of these by admissible evidence. Every debt-specific discovery request, affirmative defense, and motion in this skill targets one of these elements:

1. Standing — plaintiff owns this specific account. Requires a complete chain from the originator with account-level identification. See references/chain-of-title.md and references/ucc-article-9.md.

2. The agreement — defendant agreed to this specific contract. The original cardholder agreement (not a specimen) must be authenticated. See references/evidence-debt-buyer.md (ER 901, 902, 1002 applied to debt records) and references/fdcpa.md (verification-stage challenges).

3. Performance — plaintiff / predecessors provided the credit. Usually stipulated but occasionally contested.

4. Breach — defendant defaulted. Monthly statements establish the default date and amount.

5. Damages — specific amount, calculated correctly, timely. Charged-off balance vs. post-charge-off interest and fees are frequently inflated. See references/wa-statutes-of-limitations.md for the timeliness piece.

Fact-pattern triage

Match the complaint's attachments against references/fact-patterns.md. The ten recurring patterns:

1. Generic pool schedule / redacted bill of sale
2. Missing monthly statements
3. No original cardholder agreement
4. Remote-custodian affidavit (Ziegler / Discover Bank v. Bridges problem)
5. Account-stated vs. written-contract confusion (SOL trap)
6. Time-barred suit (Reg F § 1006.26 + FDCPA § 1692e/f)
7. Unlicensed collection agency (Gray v. Suttell / RCW 19.16)
8. Naming-churn / chain-of-title gaps
9. Default-judgment trap (CR/CRLJ 60 vacation)
10. Zombie / re-aged debt (FCRA + RCW 19.16)

The pattern is informational — it maps a recurring fact pattern to the procedural options the rules make available: (a) the choice between an MTD and an answer, (b) the affirmative defenses that fit the pattern, (c) the counterclaims the pattern raises, and (d) the discovery the pattern points toward. Which of these the litigant pursues remains the litigant's decision (and any counsel the litigant retains).

Affirmative defenses commonly in play

Plead every one that fits; unpleaded defenses are waived (CR 8(c) / CRLJ 8(c)). For a typical debt-buyer case:

• Statute of limitations (RCW 4.16 — see references/wa-statutes-of-limitations.md for the day count applicable to the cause of action pleaded)
• Lack of standing (CR 17(a), real-party-in-interest)
• Lack of capacity to sue (RCW 19.16 licensing requirement — Gray v. Suttell; see references/wa-consumer-protection.md)
• Failure to state a claim (CR 12(b)(6), preserved)
• Failure of consideration (Article 9 attachment deficiency)
• Unclean hands / FDCPA violations
• Set-off (FDCPA / CPA damages offset any judgment)
• Waiver / estoppel / laches (fact-specific)
• Accord and satisfaction (if prior settlement)
• Payment
• Reservation of additional defenses pending discovery

Counterclaims commonly in play

Every fact supporting an affirmative defense in a debt-buyer case usually also supports a counterclaim:

• FDCPA — 15 U.S.C. § 1692 et seq. Federal claim cognizable in state court; SOL is short and runs from violation (Rotkiske v. Klemm). See ../wa-law-references/references/federal-debt-laws/ for current statutory text.
• Regulation F — 12 C.F.R. Part 1006, enforced through FDCPA
• WA Collection Agency Act — RCW 19.16; see references/wa-consumer-protection.md for the per-se WA-CPA pathway and the current licensing-violation framework.
• WA Consumer Protection Act — RCW 19.86. RCW 19.16 violations can supply a per-se pathway that bypasses the Hangman Ridge public-interest element; see references/wa-consumer- protection.md for the elements and the current treble-damages cap.
• FCRA (if re-aging / credit reporting involved — Pattern 10)

Prayer for relief should include: dismissal; actual damages; FDCPA statutory damages; treble CPA damages (subject to the statutory cap); reasonable attorney fees (see references/fees-consumer-debt.md for the debt-specific fee-shifting grounds, and ../wa-law-references/references/fees-and-costs.md for the general RCW 4.84 and rule-based grounds); costs; such further relief. For current statutory-damages amounts and the CPA treble-damages cap, consult the references corpus — those figures are amended by statute.

Discovery — target the elements

Every RFP, IROG, and RFA maps to one of the five plaintiff-must- prove elements above. See the banks in references/:

• references/rfp-debt-buyer.md — requests for production
• references/interrogatories-debt-buyer.md — interrogatories
• references/rfa-debt-buyer.md — requests for admission
• references/meet-and-confer-debt-buyer.md — CRLJ 26(f) / CR 26(i) meet-and-confer paragraphs for debt-buyer deficiencies

Sequence discovery in rounds (see wa-discovery/SKILL.md for the general cadence):

• Round 1 — standing and chain of title
• Round 2 — damages and account history
• Round 3 — predicate acts for FDCPA / CPA counterclaim

Composition

This bundle composes with:

• wa-first-30-days — initial response workflow (calls into this skill's fact-patterns, affirmative defenses, and counterclaims for debt-buyer cases)
• wa-discovery — procedural discovery framework (this skill supplies the debt-specific request banks)
• wa-law-references — civil rules, evidence rules, fees-and- costs, local rules, online-sources, general key-cases, citation format
• wa-statewide-format — GR 14 formatting
• wa-kcdc — King County District Court specifics
• wa-pro-se — pro-se drafting framework, service protocol
• wa-fact-check — citation verification before filing
• wa-file-packet — packet assembly
• wa-draft-motion, wa-draft-declaration, wa-draft-order, wa-draft-note — document scaffolding

Notes

• Not legal advice. This skill supplies drafting aids. The user owns every word filed.
• Shepardize / KeyCite every case before citing. Washington business-records foundation doctrine has evolved; debt-buyer standing doctrine is still developing.
• Verify statutes and rules against the current RCW text and current court-rule text. Use wa-law-references/references/online-sources.md for canonical URLs and wa-fact-check before filing.
• Federal backstops state. Always pair FDCPA with RCW 19.16 so the state statute catches any federal-scope gap (e.g., debt buyers collecting "for their own account" outside FDCPA's primary definition under Henson v. Santander).