Over Two Years, the Share of Private Debt Collectors Grew Four Times

The number of debts in the Unified Registry of Debtors increased by 60% from the start of this year—while it was 4.2 million in January, October saw 6.8 million debts.

Since 2017, not only the state enforcement service but also private executors collect debts. It is an example of a partnership between the state and private businesses where the latter perform the functions of the former. Similarly to a state enforcement service, a private collector can arrest the debtors’ accounts, as well as seize and put up their property at auction, etc. The number of debt collection proceedings by private collectors doubled in 2021—from 278,000 to 547,000, showing a 95% increase.

Private collectors currently account for 8% of all debt proceedings in the country versus 2% in December 2019.

The current 547,524 “private” case proceedings are being conducted by 276 executors. Notably, the ten most active executors are conducting one-third of overall proceedings (184,819 or more than 33%). Every one in the top 5 is running over 20,000 cases simultaneously.