How to Remove CBE Group Collections from Your Credit Report

If you recently checked your credit report and spotted “CBE Group” listed as a collections account, you may be wondering why it’s there and what you can do about it. Indeed, having any collections account listed on your credit may harm your credit score. If you find your credit report contains a false or erroneous collection account debt from the CBE Group, this post explains how you can remove CBE Group from your credit report.

Key points

• CBE Group appears to be a legitimate debt collection agency, based on its accreditation and A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau.
• You may be able to remove CBE Group from your credit report if the debt is inaccurate.
• Collections from CBE Group can remain on your credit report for up to seven years, which may lower your credit score.

Table of contents

• What is CBE Group?
• Will CBE Group sue or garnish your wages?
• Who does CBE Group collect for?
• How to remove CBE Group debt from your credit report
• Why does CBE Group keep calling me?

What is CBE Group?

CBE Group appears to be a legitimate debt collection agency currently accredited with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and has an A+ rating.^[1] A BBB-accredited business means that the BBB has determined that CBE Group met certain accreditation standards, including making a good faith effort to find solutions to consumer complaints.^[2]

Headquartered in Cedar Falls, Iowa, CBE Group also has call centers in Texas, Tennessee, and the Philippines. CBE Group performs both first- and third-party collections for private and government entities. If the CBE Group is listed on your report, that may mean the agency purchased your debt from another company you did business with that declared your debt delinquent and charged it off.

If you see the CBE Group listed on your credit report, you should see the following contact information:

Phone number:

• (319) 234-6686

Website:

• www.cbegroup.com

Mailing addresses:

• 1309 Technology Pkwy, Cedar Falls, IA 50613 ^[1]

Will CBE Group sue or garnish your wages?

CBE Group may be able to sue you and garnish your wages, if you do not pay the debt and if they are successful in obtaining a court order against you. Wage garnishment laws vary by state, so make sure to research your state’s laws.^[3]

While CBE Group is legally obligated to stop contacting you under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) if you ask them to, this likely doesn't resolve the underlying debt, and it may reduce the information you receive about your account. In some cases, asking a collector to stop contacting you can increase the chance they'll pursue the debt through a lawsuit instead. If CBE Group does sue and you don't respond, they may be able to obtain a default judgment against you; if you do respond and contest the debt, they would generally need to demonstrate to the court that you owe it.^[4]

If CBE Group has sued you and you don’t believe you’re responsible for the debt, you may want to seek legal advice from an attorney or a law firm with experience handling debt collections cases.^[4]

Who does CBE Group collect for?

CBE Group collects debt for private companies and government entities alike. The group is also one of only three private collection agencies partnered with the Internal Revenu Service (IRS) to collect on overdue federal taxes,^[5] CBE Group also collects on the following types of debt:

• Healthcare
• Retail
• Telecom
• Utility
• Financing and banking
• Government and tax ^[6]

If CBE Group is calling you, they believe that somewhere in your payment history, you owe one of the debts listed above. Perhaps you forgot to pay your phone bill or moved from a previous address and forgot to pay the final cable bill.

If the debt goes unpaid for months, the original party may sell the delinquent debt to agencies like the CBE Group, which attempt to collect on that debt.^[7]

How to remove CBE Group debt from your credit report

Depending on your situation, you may need to take several steps to try to remove a collections account or an erroneous debt from your credit report, including items from the CBE Group.

Write a debt validation letter

Before you can determine the best way to remove CBE Group from your credit report, you must understand if the debt is accurate or inaccurate. If it’s been less than 30 days since the first collection effort, requesting proof of the debt from the collection agency may be the best place to start.

If CBE Group can’t show proof, the debt can be expunged from your credit report. Debt collectors must tell you how much you owe, the name of the current creditor you owe it to, how to get the name of the original creditor, and what to do if you don’t think the debt is yours^[8]

Obtain copies of your credit report

Check which of the three major credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian and TransUnion) the collections account was reported to by obtaining copies of your credit report. You can get a free copy once a week at annualcreditreport.com to check your credit.

If the debt is inaccurate, dispute it

If you find incorrect or inaccurate information on your credit report regarding the debt (for instance, the debt amount is much higher than you remember, it belongs to someone else, or it’s outdated), the collector may not be able to prove that you owe the money for that debt.

You can dispute the debt to get the inaccurate item removed so that you fix the error on your credit reports. File a dispute with the three major credit bureaus and ask them to remove the inaccurate item from your credit report.^[9]

If the debt is accurate, negotiate a settlement, a pay for delete or a goodwill removal

If you owe the debt listed and the validation letter confirms it, you can offer to negotiate a settlement or set up an installment plan to close the collection account. Closing a collection account through a negotiated settlement is likely better than leaving it unpaid and open, just waiting for it to drop off your credit report.

Remember that only inaccuracies can be disputed and removed from your credit report. Generally, the primary options for removing accurate debt from your credit report are to negotiate a pay for delete or request a goodwill removal. While you may negotiate one of these successfully, bear in mind that debt collectors furnish data according to the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), which means they are obligated to report accurate debts. Even if they agree to a pay for delete or goodwill deletion, they do not have to follow through with it and can still report the debt.

Pay for delete

Once you’ve received notice of the debt you owe, you can try to negotiate a pay for delete, asking CBE Group to remove the debt from your credit reports in exchange for you paying off the agreed-upon debt amount. Through this method, you would request a pay for delete, in writing, asking CBE Group to accept the payment amount you are able, or willing, to pay to have the debt removed. However, debt collection companies may deny your request, and even if they do accept it, they can’t remove the negative mark from the original creditor and are under no obligation to remove the collection from your credit history. You may want to get their agreement in writing.^[10]

Even if the account still appears on your credit report, it may be beneficial to pay your debt because some credit scoring models do not penalize you for paid collections. These include FICO® 9 and 10, VantageScore® 3.0 and VantageScore® 4.0. Keep in mind these are currently not widely used scoring models. ^[11]

Goodwill removal

Another way to try and remove CBE Group from your credit report is with a goodwill letter. The letter should explain why the debt occurred and provide proof that this was an extenuating circumstance to your otherwise consistent payment history. For example, you lost your job or had a medical emergency.^[12]

Like a pay for delete, a goodwill letter is not an official strategy and is not guaranteed to work. The Federal Trade Commission states that if negative information is accurate, it will simply take time to go away.^[13]

Why does CBE Group keep calling me?

The CBE Group keeps calling you because they believe you owe them a debt and believe that persistently calling you will ultimately get you to relent and pay that debt. However, all creditors, including CBE Group, have limits to how often they can call you.

All debt collectors are bound by the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA), which makes it illegal for debt collectors to use abusive , unfair or deceptive practices when collecting debts. The law also prohibits debt collection companies from the following:

• Calling you more than seven times within a seven-day period or within seven days of last talking to you about a debt over the phone
• Privately messaging you on social media if you ask them to stop
• Contacting you before 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m. local time without your permission
• Contacting you by email or text if you ask them to stop
• Contacting you at work if you have told them you are not allowed to receive calls at work

How can CBE Group contact me?

Debt collectors like CBE Group are allowed to call you, email you, text you, message you on social media or send letters to collect a debt that you owe.

The debt collector must give you “validation information” about the debt, either the first time they speak with you or within five days of them first contacting you. They must include the following information:

• Their name and mailing address
• The name of the creditor you owe the debt to
• The amount of money you owe, including interest, fees, payments, and credits
• What you can do if you don’t think the debt is yours
• Your debt collection rights, including your right to information about the creditor, as long as you ask for it within 30 days of receiving the validation information.^[8]

Know your rights

If the CBE Group has contacted you, understand your rights. Like any debt collector, the CBE Group may not:^[9]

• Communicate with any person other than you, your attorney, a consumer reporting agency if otherwise permitted by law, the creditor, the attorney of the creditor, or the attorney of the debt collector.
• Tack on interest, fees, or other extra charges related to the original debt (unless the original contract or law says they can).
• Use false or misleading information in connection with the debt.
• Harass or abuse you in connection with the debt.

If you don’t believe the debt is valid, you have 30 days from the time you were notified of the debt to dispute it, which means that CBE Group will have to prove that you owe the debt and that they are the valid holder of the debt.

Sources

1. Better Business Bureau. “The CBE Group Inc,” https://www.bbb.org/us/ia/cedar-falls/profile/collections-agencies/the-c-b-e-group-inc-0664-100794.
2. Better Business Bureau. “Exclusive Programs and Services.” https://www.bbb.org/get-accredited.
3. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. "Can a debt collector garnish my bank account or my wages?" https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/can-a-debt-collector-garnish-my-bank-account-or-my-wages-en-1439/.
4. NOLO, “Should I tell Debt Collectors to Stop Contacting Me?” https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/should-i-tell-debt-collector-stop-contacting-me.html.
5. IRS, “Private Debt Collection” https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/private-debt-collection.
6. CBE Companies. https://cbegroup.com/.
7. Experian. “What type of debt can go to collections?” https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/what-type-of-debt-can-go-to-collections/.
8. Federal Trade Commission. “Debt Collection FAQs”. https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/debt-collection-faqs.
9. Federal Trade Commission. "Fair Debt Collection Practices Act," https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/rules/fair-debt-collection-practices-act-text.
10. InCharge Debt Solutions. “Pay For Delete Explained” https://www.incharge.org/debt-relief/credit-counseling/credit-score-and-credit-report/pay-for-delete/.
11. Experian. “Can Paying off Collections Raise Your Credit Score?” https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/can-paying-off-collections-raise-your-credit-score/.
12. Credit Karma. “Goodwill letters: What you need to know.” https://www.creditkarma.com/advice/i/goodwill-letter.
13. Federal Trade Commission, “Fixing Your Credit FAQs” https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/fixing-your-credit-faqs.

About the author

Ana Gonzalez-Ribeiro, MBA, AFC® is an Accredited Financial Counselor® and a Bilingual Personal Finance Writer and Educator dedicated to helping populations that need financial literacy and counseling. Her informative articles have been published in various news outlets and websites including Huffington Post, Fidelity, Fox Business News, MSN and Yahoo Finance. She also founded the personal financial and motivational site www.AcetheJourney.com and translated into Spanish the book, Financial Advice for Blue Collar America by Kathryn B. Hauer, CFP. Ana teaches Spanish or English personal finance courses on behalf of the W!SE (Working In Support of Education) program has taught workshops for nonprofits in NYC.

About the author

Becca has over 10 years of experience as a content writer, working across various industries including finance, digital marketing, education, travel, and technology. Her work has been featured in publications including Forbes, Business Insider, AOL, Yahoo, GOBankingRates, and more.