State directory

Collecting debt in Indiana: licensing, bonds and statutes of limitations.

Anyone conducting a collection agency in Indiana must hold a collection agency license from the Secretary of State, Securities Division, applied for and renewed through NMLS, with a $100 application and renewal fee plus $30 per branch office, a $5,000 electronic surety bond for each Indiana office, and licenses that expire every December 31; a nonresident agency whose only contact is interstate phone, mail or fax on behalf of nonresident creditors is exempt.

License required Bond $5,000 Written contracts: 6 yearsVerified 2026-09-20

General information, not legal advice. Every figure on this page links to the statute, rule or regulator page it came from, with the operative words quoted, and the date we verified it. Rules change; confirm with the regulator or your counsel before acting, and tell us if something here is out of date.

Licensing and bonding

Do you need a license to collect in Indiana?

Indiana licenses collection agencies through the Secretary of State via NMLS for $100 a year plus $30 per branch, with a $5,000 bond for each Indiana office, and every license expires December 31. Out-of-state agencies that only phone, mail or fax Indiana residents on behalf of out-of-state creditors are exempt; the statute does not name debt buyers, and the Secretary of State has said a company collecting debt it owns is not a collection agency, though no appellate court has ruled on it.

Requirement
License required
Ind. Code § 25-11-1-7(a) (Licensing of Collection Agencies by Secretary of State, IC 25-11-1); definition IC 25-11-1-1(b); application IC 25-11-1-3
Regulator
Indiana Secretary of State, Securities Division
Licensing page
Surety bond
$5,000

$5,000 for each office the applicant operates in Indiana, aggregated into one Electronic Surety Bond filed through NMLS and associated with the principal office (SOS page: 'The bond must be equal to five thousand dollars ($5,000) for each office operated in Indiana. The sum for all offices should be aggregated into one Electronic Surety Bond and associated with the principal office.'). Required with every original and renewal application; runs to the people of Indiana; continuous with the license and renewal periods; conditioned on faithful accounting and on remitting to the client within 60 days of collection. Electronic bond mandatory since July 1, 2020 (P.L.152-2020). No tiers by volume. The statute computes the amount by Indiana offices only, so the amount for a licensee with no Indiana office is not stated (see unresolved).

IC 25-11-1-3(f)(1)
NMLS
Yes, via NMLS

SOS page: 'All filings and fees for a collection agency registration are made through the Nationwide Multistate Licensing System ("NMLS")'. IC 25-11-1-3(a) defines NMLS; 3(g) authorizes designating NMLS as the sole processor of applications and renewals; the bond 'shall be filed through the NMLS' (3(f)(1)). IC 25-11-1-3(h)(1): the Division may not force NMLS participation on persons not required to be licensed. Licensure lookup on NMLS Consumer Access.

Application fee
$100

IC 25-11-1-3(c): 'Every original and renewal application of any person desiring to conduct a collection agency shall be accompanied by a fee of one hundred dollars ($100) plus an additional fee of thirty dollars ($30) for each branch office operated by the applicant'. SOS page: 'The non-refundable initial filing fee is one hundred dollars ($100) and is paid through the NMLS'; branch (NMLS MU3) initial filing fee $30. Fees are retained if the application is denied (IC 25-11-1-5(a)). IC 25-11-1-3(h)(2) lets the Secretary of State require a reasonable NMLS processing fee; NMLS-side fee amounts were not verifiable (the NMLS checklist URL redirects to a SharePoint app).

IC 25-11-1-3(c), (h)(2)
Renewal fee
$100

annual, renews December 31

IC 25-11-1-3(c)-(e); IC 25-11-1-5(a)
Branches and other fees
See note

Branch office license (NMLS MU3) required for any fixed location not designated the main office where the person holds itself out as a collection agency or the address appears on its cards or advertising (IC 25-11-1-1(d); unlawful to operate one without satisfying 3(c) and 3(e), IC 25-11-1-7(d)); $30 per branch on original and renewal applications; each Indiana office adds $5,000 to the aggregated bond. Reciprocal license under IC 25-11-1-5(b) at the same fees and bond. SOS fee page: https://securities.sos.in.gov/fines-costs-fees/.

Other requirements
9 items

sworn application through NMLS Form MU1: the application 'shall be duly sworn to before an officer qualified to administer oaths' (IC 25-11-1-3(b)); notarized Collection Agency Licensing Affidavit (SOS page; NMLS form IN-SOS3); resident agent: 'Any applicant who is a nonresident of Indiana shall also submit a statement appointing an agent or attorney resident upon whom all legal process against the applicant may be served' (IC 25-11-1-3(f)(2)); qualifications for individual applicants and each officer, partner, member or manager who actively manages collections: U.S. citizen, good moral character, at least 18, no record as a defaulter in money collected for another, no disqualifying regulatory adjudications in the past 10 years (IC 25-11-1-4); client trust deposits: deposit client money not less than once a week in a special account at a local depository until remitted; remit with an accounting within 60 days of collection; keep a record of money collected and remitted (IC 25-11-1-7(b)-(c)); branch licenses via Form MU3 for each non-main office (IC 25-11-1-1(d), 25-11-1-7(d)); disclosure requirements under IC 24-4.9 (IC 25-11-1-7(e)); no license to judges or full-time law enforcement officers (IC 25-11-1-11); no financial statement, fingerprint, exam, or physical Indiana office requirement appears in IC 25-11-1 or on the SOS page; NMLS-side requirements (credit report, fingerprints) could not be confirmed because the NMLS checklist was not retrievable

Who needs it
Third-party collection agencies
Yes
Debt buyers
It depends
Collection law firms
No
Out-of-state agencies collecting from residents
It depends
Original creditors collecting their own accounts
It depends

Exemptions. IC 25-11-1-2 excludes: (a) attorneys at law; (b) persons regularly employed on a regular wage or salary as credit men or in a similar capacity, except independent contractors; (c) banks, trust departments, fiduciaries and financial institutions, licensees under IC 24-4.4 (first lien mortgage lending) and IC 24-4.5 (Uniform Consumer Credit Code), and licensees under IC 28-5-1 (industrial loan and investment companies); (d) licensed real estate brokers; (e) employees of licensees; (f) any business whose primary object, business or pursuit is not the collection of claims; (g) electric, gas, water or telephone public utilities and their agents; (h) express companies regulated under IC 8-2.1 or IC 8-3. IC 25-11-1-5(d) exempts nonresident agencies with only incidental contact (interstate telephone, mail or fax on behalf of nonresident creditors).

Statutes of limitations

How long can a debt be sued on in Indiana?

Indiana gives every kind of consumer debt six years, running from the first missed payment, and a judgment lien lasts ten years and can be renewed by a new action before it lapses. A voluntary partial payment restarts the clock and, under Indiana case law, revives a debt that was already time-barred.

Written contract
6 years
IC 34-11-2-9(b) (written contracts for the payment of money); IC 34-11-2-11(a) (other written contracts, 10 years)
“an action upon promissory notes, bills of exchange, or other written contracts for the payment of money executed after August 31, 1982, must be commenced within six (6) years after the cause of action accrues.”
Oral contract
6 years
IC 34-11-2-7(1)
“The following actions must be commenced within six (6) years after the cause of action accrues: (1) Actions on accounts and contracts not in writing.”
Promissory note
6 years
IC 34-11-2-9(b); IC 26-1-3.1-118(a), (b)
“an action to enforce the obligation of a party to pay a note payable at a definite time must be commenced within six (6) years after the due date or dates stated in the note or, if a due date is accelerated, within six (6) years after the accelerated due date.”
Open account and credit card
6 years
IC 34-11-2-7(1); Smither v. Asset Acceptance, LLC, 919 N.E.2d 1153 (Ind. Ct. App. Jan. 12, 2010)
“the more appropriate statute appears to be Indiana Code Section 34-11-2-7(1), which governs '[a]ctions on accounts and contracts not in writing.' ... Thus, we will treat Smither's debt as an open account debt for statute of limitations purposes.”

The Court of Appeals treats credit-card debt as an open account / unwritten contract under 34-11-2-7(1) (six years), not a written contract for the payment of money under 34-11-2-9 (also six years): card accounts 'closely resemble the common law definition of an open account' where the balance is 'unknown and fluctuating and the account is kept open in anticipation of future transactions'. Smither adopted the reasoning of Illinois's Portfolio Acquisitions v. Feltman and McMahan v. Snap on Tool Corp., 478 N.E.2d 116 (Ind. Ct. App. 1985): 'The written document must in fact be the basis for the claim being pressed.' Both periods are six years, so classification changes accrual, not the number.

Judgment
20 yearsrenewable
When the clock starts, and what restarts it
Accrual

All periods run from when 'the cause of action accrues' (34-11-2-7, -9). Credit cards / open accounts: Smither holds the period 'commences from the date the account is due' and runs, at the latest, from the first missed minimum payment after the last payment ('Providian and its successor Asset had, at the very latest, six years from March 11, 2000, to file suit', where the last payment was Feb. 9, 2000). A charge-off is 'an accounting device' that is not an acceleration; a creditor 'cannot indefinitely postpone the commencement of the statute of limitations by continuing to send additional statements', and invoking an optional acceleration clause after the period has run is 'per se an unreasonable amount of time'. Mutual, open, current accounts: 'from the date of the last item proved in the account on either side' (IC 34-11-3-1). Notes payable at a definite time: due date or acceleration (26-1-3.1-118(a)). Judgments: lien 10 years from rendition (34-55-9-2); action on a judgment 10 years (34-11-2-11(a)); presumed satisfied at 20 years (34-11-2-12).

Smither v. Asset Acceptance, LLC, 919 N.E.2d 1153, 1160-62 (Ind. Ct. App. 2010); IC 34-11-3-1; IC 26-1-3.1-118
Partial payment restarts the period
Yes
IC 34-11-9-3; Clark v. University of Evansville, 784 N.E.2d 942 (Ind. Ct. App. Feb. 26, 2003); Meehan v. Meehan's Estate, 98 Ind. App. 9, 186 N.E. 908 (1933); Spencer v. McCune, 73 Ind. App. 484, 126 N.E. 30 (1920)
“This chapter does not take away or lessen the effect of any payment made by any person. However, no endorsement or memorandum of any payment made: (1) upon any instrument of writing; and (2) by or on behalf of the party to whom the payment is purported to be made; is considered sufficient to exempt the case from this chapter.”
Written acknowledgment restarts the period
Yes
IC 34-11-9-1
“An acknowledgment or promise is not evidence of a new or continuing contract, for the purpose of taking the case out of the operation of this article, unless the acknowledgment or promise is: (1) in writing; and (2) signed by the party to be charged by the acknowledgment or promise.”
Borrowing statute
Yes
IC 34-11-4-2; IC 34-11-4-1

Narrow borrowing rule: the foreign bar 'is a defense' only where (1) the cause arose outside Indiana against a nonresident defendant, (2) the defendant has no Indiana agent for service, and (3) the cause 'is fully barred by the laws both of the place where the defendant resides and of the place where the cause of action arose'. It does not help Indiana residents sued on out-of-state debt; Indiana applies its own period as forum law, and a contractual choice-of-law clause does not import another state's limitations period (Smither, rejecting New Hampshire's 3-year period despite the card agreement's NH clause). 34-11-4-1 tolls while the defendant is a nonresident without an Indiana agent for service.

Time-barred debt
Status after the period runs
Unenforceable

The debt exists but cannot be sued on; a suit can be defended by raising the defense.

Collector must disclose that the debt is time-barred
No
IC 25-11-1-7 (collection agency act, unlawful acts)

Pass B read IC 25-11-1 (collection agencies) in full: its unlawful-acts section covers licensing, remittance and trust-account duties only. Both passes searched Titles 24, 25 and 34 for time-barred-debt or statute-of-limitations disclosure language and found none; Indiana has no state FDCPA analogue. Only federal Reg. F 12 CFR 1006.26(b) applies. Negative finding.

A payment revives a time-barred debt
Yes
Clark v. University of Evansville, 784 N.E.2d 942 (Ind. Ct. App. 2003) (quoting Meehan v. Meehan's Estate, 186 N.E. 908 (Ind. App. 1933), and citing Spencer v. McCune, 126 N.E. 30 (Ind. App. 1920)); IC 34-11-9-3; IC 34-11-9-4

Clark addresses a debt already barred: the check was dishonored shortly after Dec. 8, 1995, the three-year period under IC 26-1-3.1-118(c) had run, and the debtor's $100 money order arrived Feb. 23, 1999; the court held 'partial payment of a debt may constitute "an admission of continued indebtedness" which "remove[s] the bar of the statute"' and that 'a partial payment that operates to toll the statute of limitations also sets the statute of limitations running anew', so a suit filed Feb. 25, 2002 was timely. Condition: the payment must be 'accompanied by circumstances or evidence amounting to an unqualified acknowledgment of more being due, from which a promise may be inferred as a matter of fact and not as a matter of law, to pay the remainder' (Meehan); an undisputed voluntary payment credited to the account sufficed and no writing is required (34-11-9-3 preserves 'the effect of any payment', while a creditor's own endorsement is not enough). 34-11-9-4: a joint debtor 'in whose favor the statute of limitations has operated' is not bound by a co-debtor's later payment. No Indiana statute extinguishes the debt; the bar is an affirmative defense, so status is unenforceable, not extinguished.

Sources

Where this page comes from.

Researched in two independent passes from primary sources (the statute, the administrative code and the regulator's own pages), then reconciled against the text where the passes disagreed. Verified 2026-09-20. Licensing is re-verified quarterly and limitation periods annually.

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