Treasury Debt Defense

On October 7, 2012, the Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Geithner, issued Treasury Order 136-01 which consolidated and re-designated the bureaus formerly known as the Bureau of the Public Debt and the Financial Management Service as the Bureau of the Fiscal Service.

This Order delegated to the Commissioner, Bureau of the Fiscal Service, the authority that was previously delegated to the Commissioner of the Public Debt and the Commissioner, Financial Management Service.

As a result of this Treasury Order, all federal non-tax delinquent debts are now serviced and collected by this special Bureau of the Treasury Department. 

If your federal non-tax delinquent debt (e.g. SBA loan, SEC debt, FCC debt, USDA loan etc.) has been transferred to the Department of the Treasury (DoT) from an existing federal creditor agency, it will be aggressively serviced and collected by the Bureau of the Fiscal Service (BFS).

BFS can use those aggressive collection tools available to all federal agencies pursuant to the Debt Collection Improvement Act of 1996.

Some of the aggressive collection tools available for Treasury debt defense are:

1. Submission of the federal debt to the Treasury Offset Program (TOP);
2. Credit bureau reporting;
3. Referral to private collection agencies (PCA) for servicing or purchase;
4. Administrative Wage Garnishment (AWG);
5. Referral to the Department of Justice (DoJ) for collateral liquidation or collection litigation;
6. Debarment from obtaining other federal loans, guaranties and loan insurance;
7. Revocation or suspension of federal licenses and eligibility;
8. Charge-off and related reporting to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) as potential Form 1099-C income

If your federal non-tax debt has been referred to the BFS for cross-servicing, is is critically important for you as a borrower, obligor or guarantor to hire qualified Federal Agency Practitioners who can help defend you against some of the Bureau’s most aggressive collection actions as noted above.

Because practice before the Department of the Treasury and the Bureau of Fiscal Service requires specific knowledge and understanding of several core areas of law and process, most notably (1) the federal agency maze, (2) federal administrative law and procedure, (3) constitutional law requirements, (4) federal administrative litigation, (5) federal administrative hearing representation and appeals, (6) federal agency rules and internal procedures of the referring federal creditor agency which originated the federal non-tax debt, (7) federal collection defense representation, (8) Department of Justice collateral liquidation and collection litigation defense, (9) bankruptcy law and asset exemptions and (10) DoT compromise and negotiation tactics, it is very important that you conduct your due diligence and choose your professional representatives wisely.

If your federal agency practitioners are not authorized to practice before the federal agencies pursuant to the Agency Practice Act and do not have experience with the core areas as identified above (and all non-attorney federal agency representatives do not have the necessary qualification as they neither have the education, training or, most importantly, the actual license to legally practice within the scope of these parameters), then “caveat emptor” or “buyer beware.”