Collecting debt in Kansas: licensing, bonds and statutes of limitations.
Kansas has no collection agency license, registration, or bond for third-party collectors; a collector that takes assignment of 'supervised loans' (consumer loans with an APR over 12%) and collects or enforces them must hold a Supervised Loan license from the Office of the State Bank Commissioner (via NMLS, $100,000 bond), and assignees of other Kansas consumer credit transactions must file as Consumer Credit Filers.
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 Rules change; confirm with the regulator or your counsel before acting, and tell us if something here is out of date.
Do you need a license to collect in Kansas?
Kansas does not license, register or bond third-party collection agencies; the FDCPA and the Kansas Consumer Protection Act govern conduct. A collector that buys consumer loans with an APR over 12% needs a Supervised Loan license from the Office of the State Bank Commissioner (NMLS, $600 application, $100,000 bond), and an unlicensed assignee cannot collect those loans.
No bond for collection agencies. Only the Supervised Loan license (debt buyers/assignees of supervised loans) requires 'a proper surety bond of at least $100,000' that must not expire for two years after surrender, revocation or expiration of the license (K.S.A. 16a-2-302(2)(a)); net worth requirement set by rule, capped at $500,000 (16a-2-302(2)(b)). No bond for Consumer Credit Filers.
No collection agency license. The Supervised Loan license and SL Branch, if triggered for a debt buyer, are applied for and renewed through NMLS (OSBC: NMLS 'is used for applications/renewals for this license type'). Consumer Credit Filers do not use NMLS; they file at online.osbckansas.gov.
No fee: no collection agency license. For the Supervised Loan license (debt buyers of supervised loans): 'New / Renewal Application $600'; 'Initial License fee / Minimum Volume $250'; 'New / Renewal Branch Location $100' (OSBC Licensing Fee Summary, Rev. 8/2026), plus NMLS system fees. Consumer Credit Filer: 'ANNUAL FEE: $30 per business location' plus volume fee '$15.00 for each $100,000.00 or part thereof' of average unpaid balance. Fees are set by the administrator under K.S.A. 16a-6-104(5).
n/a for collection agencies. Supervised Loan license: 'The license year shall be the calendar year and the license shall expire on December 31'; renewal filed 'on or before December 1 of the current year' (K.S.A. 16a-2-302(1)(b), (d)); renewal $600 plus annual volume fee ($10.00 per $100,000 outstanding consumer credit transactions); late fee up to $500 if received Dec. 2-31; reinstatement $500 through the last day of February (16a-2-302(1)(f); fee summary). Consumer Credit Filer annual fee due on or before August 31 (K.S.A. 16a-6-203(1)).
n/a for collection agencies. Supervised Loan branch license $100 new/renewal for each additional supervised lending location; SL annual report due April 15 (OSBC page). Consumer Credit Filer fee is per business location.
None for collection agencies. Supervised Loan licensees only: financial responsibility, character and fitness investigation (16a-2-302(2)); minimum net worth by regulation, capped at $500,000 (16a-2-302(2)(b)); fingerprinting may be required via NMLS (16a-6-104(1)(k)); license number on all advertising directed at Kansas residents; keep ads 36 months (16a-2-302(5)); written notice within 10 business days of office closure/relocation, name change, or change in owners/officers (16a-2-302(3)); SL annual report due April 15 (OSBC page); SL branch license for each additional supervised lending location
Adjacent rules. Not applicable to collection agencies (no license). Supervised loan licensing exemptions, K.S.A. 16a-2-311(1): supervised financial organizations, the FDIC, and 'an attorney who is forwarded contracts for collection'. Consumer Credit Filer part does not apply to supervised financial organizations or to SL licensees except as to consumer credit sales/leases, their assignment, or 'attorneys or collection agencies that receive payment for collection purposes' (16a-6-201(2)); OSBC CCF page: exempt if not 'regularly engaged' (25 or fewer extensions of credit in the preceding year), sellers accepting lender credit cards exclusively, business/agricultural-purpose-only creditors. KCPA 'consumer transaction' excludes insurance contracts and compliant disposition of repossessed collateral (50-624(c)).
How long can a debt be sued on in Kansas?
Kansas has no open-account statute, so credit-card debt is normally a three-year unwritten-contract claim unless the creditor holds a complete signed agreement, which gets five years. A partial payment restarts the clock in Kansas even after the period has run, and no writing is needed for a payment to have that effect.
“The following actions shall be brought within five (5) years: (1) An action upon any agreement, contract or promise in writing.”
“The following actions shall be brought within three (3) years: (1) All actions upon contracts, obligations or liabilities expressed or implied but not in writing.”
“an action to enforce the obligation of a party to pay a note payable at a definite time must be commenced within six years after the due date or dates stated in the note or, if a due date is accelerated, within six years after the accelerated due date.”
“A contract which is partly in writing and partly oral is in legal effect an oral contract so far as the statute of limitations may be concerned. The writing necessary to have the additional protection of the five-year statute must be full and complete in itself so as not to require proof of extrinsic facts to establish all essential contractual terms.”
Kansas has no open-account statute; the choice is 3 years (60-512(1), not in writing) or 5 years (60-511(1), in writing). The controlling test is the Kansas Supreme Court's rule in Miller: a writing gets the five-year period only if it is complete in itself without extrinsic proof of essential terms. A card account proved by a generic cardholder agreement plus statements requires extrinsic proof, so it is a 3-year claim; a signed agreement containing all material terms could get 5 years. No published Kansas appellate decision squarely classifies consumer credit-card debt. In PRA v. Kimrey (unpublished) the parties agreed on 3 years and the court premised its analysis on it without deciding the point. Treat 3 years as the default.
“if a renewal affidavit is not filed or if execution, including any garnishment proceeding, support enforcement proceeding or proceeding in aid of execution, is not issued, within five years from the date of the entry of any judgment in any court of record in this state ... the judgment ... shall become dormant, and shall cease to operate as a lien on the real estate of the judgment debtor.”
Civil actions 'can only be commenced within the period prescribed ... after the cause of action shall have accrued' (K.S.A. 60-510). Kansas has no open-account accrual statute; Sheldon Grain & Feed Co. v. Schuetz, 207 Kan. 108 (1971) (annotation under 60-512) treats a mutual, open, running account as a whole rather than item by item. A written-contract claim accrues at breach regardless of discovery (Doyle v. Black and Veatch, No. 125,015, Kan. Ct. App. 2023). Notes: accrual is the stated or accelerated due date (84-3-118(a)); a demand note with no demand is barred after 10 years without payment of principal or interest (84-3-118(b)); for an installment note the period for the whole debt runs from maturity unless the lender accelerates (Warner v. Elftman, No. 125,342, Kan. Ct. App. June 16, 2023, unpublished, following FGB Realty Advisors). K.S.A. 60-520(a) restarts the period from a part payment or a signed written acknowledgment or promise. A Chapter 61 limited action is commenced on filing only if served within 90 days, otherwise on service (K.S.A. 61-2902(a), applied in PRA v. Kimrey).
“In any case founded on contract, when any part of the principal or interest shall have been paid, or an acknowledgment of an existing liability, debt or claim, or any promise to pay the same, shall have been made, an action may be brought in such case within the period prescribed for the same, after such payment, acknowledgment or promise”
“but such acknowledgment or promise must be in writing, signed by the party to be charged thereby.”
'Where the cause of action has arisen in another state or country and by the laws of the state or country where the cause of action arose an action cannot be maintained thereon by reason of lapse of time, no action can be maintained thereon in this state except in favor of one who is a resident of this state and who has held the cause of action from the time it accrued.' Imports a shorter foreign bar only; it never lengthens a Kansas period (Muzingo v. Vaught, 18 Kan. App. 2d 823 (1993), per annotation); Kansas-resident original holders are excepted.
The debt exists but cannot be sued on; a suit can be defended by raising the defense.
“No supplier shall engage in any deceptive act or practice in connection with a consumer transaction.”
Both passes searched K.S.A. ch. 60 art. 5, ch. 50 (KCPA) and ch. 16; no Kansas statute requires a collector to disclose that a debt is time-barred. Kansas has no state debt-collection practices act or collector licensing act; only the KCPA general deceptive-acts provision and the federal FDCPA / Regulation F (12 CFR 1006.26) apply.
O'Malley (Kan. 2002) applied 60-520(a) to a promissory note whose limitations period had already run; the question presented was 'whether a conditional payment can be made on a promissory note barred by the statute of limitations and revive the obligation.' The court held 60-520 'provides the two methods by which one may revive a debt based on contract: first, by partial payment, and second, by acknowledgment or promise,' that a part payment 'is an executed acknowledgment which speaks for itself and requires no writing' (Fisher), and that any of the three means 'starts anew the period of limitations which would have been applicable had an action been brought on the original debt.' Limits: an unqualified payment revives the entire debt; a payment expressly qualified (e.g., principal only) revives only what was acknowledged (O'Malley holding); a payment by one joint debtor does not bind another without knowledge and consent (60-520(b)). The debt is not extinguished; O'Malley describes 'a debt that would otherwise be unenforceable.'
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.
- osbckansas.gov/consumers/file-a-complaint/
- osbckansas.gov/consumer-mortgage-lending/applications-forms/
- www.osbckansas.gov/cml/cml_fee_summary.pdf
- www.osbckansas.gov/consumers/faqs/
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_001_0301.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_002_0301.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_002_0302.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_002_0311.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_006_0104.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_006_0201.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_006_0202.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch16a/016a_006_0203.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch50/050_006_0024.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch50/050_006_0026.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch50/050_006_0032.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0010.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0011.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0012.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0016.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0020.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_024_0003.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_024_0004.html
- www.ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch84/084_003_0118.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0010.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0011.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0012.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0016.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_005_0020.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_024_0003.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch60/060_024_0004.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch84/084_003_0118.html
- ksrevisor.gov/statutes/chapters/ch50/050_006_0026.html
- kscourts.gov/KSCourts/media/KsCourts/Opinions/125342.pdf?ext=.pdf
- kscourts.gov/KSCourts/media/KsCourts/Opinions/112874.pdf?ext=.pdf
- kscourts.gov/KSCourts/media/KsCourts/Opinions/125015.pdf?ext=.pdf
- static.case.law/kan/226/cases/0172-01.json
- static.case.law/kan/274/cases/0084-01.json
- static.case.law/kan-app-2d/23/cases/0703-01.json
Resolvah enforces the Kansas rules at the point of contact.
Licensing by state, time-barred rules, call frequency and consent, checked before anything sends. See it on your own portfolio.
