In the 

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ 

No. 18-3350 

JESSICA SMITH, on behalf of Plaintiff and a class, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v.

SIMM ASSOCIATES, INC., 

Defendant-Appellee. 

____________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. 

No. 17-cv-769 — William C. Griesbach, Chief Judge. 

____________________ 

No. 19-1155 

RUEL NIETO, on behalf of herself and others similarly situated, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v.

SIMM ASSOCIATES, INC., 

Defendant-Appellee. 

____________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. 

No. 17-cv-6859 — Virginia M. Kendall, Judge. 

____________________ 
2 Nos. 18-3350 & 19-1155 

ARGUED MAY 21, 2019 — DECIDED JUNE 6, 2019 

____________________ 

Before FLAUM, KANNE, and SYKES, Circuit Judges. 

FLAUM, Circuit Judge. This is the consolidated appeal of 

two actions under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, 15 

U.S.C. § 1601 et seq. In both cases, debt collector Simm Associates, Inc. sent debtors a form letter stating the name of the 

“original creditor”—Comenity Capital Bank—and the “client”—PayPal Credit. Debtors sued, alleging the letters violate 

§ 1692g(a)(2) because they fail to identify the name of the 

creditor to whom the debt is currently owed. The district 

courts granted summary judgment for the debt collector. We 

affirm. 

I. Background 

Defendant-appellee Simm Associates, Inc. (“Simm”), a 

debt collection agency, sent plaintiff-appellant Jessica Smith a 

collection letter dated February 23, 2017. The letter includes 

the following information: 

CLIENT: PAYPAL CREDIT1 ORIGINAL CREDITOR: Comenity 

Capital Bank 

BALANCE: $484.28 ORIGINATION DATE: 12/10/2013 

The letter also states that, upon the debtor’s request, Simm 

will provide “the name and address of the original creditor, if 

different from the current creditor.” (emphasis added). 

 1 “PayPal Credit allows consumers to make online purchases without 

using a credit card by offering an open-ended credit plan from [a bank].” 

Maximiliano v. Simm Assocs., Inc., 17-cv-80341, 2018 WL 783104, at *1 (S.D. 

Fla. Feb. 8, 2018). Here, Comenity Capital Bank owns the debt on debtors’ 
Nos. 18-3350 & 19-1155 3

Smith filed suit on May 31, 2017 in the Eastern District of 

Wisconsin on behalf of herself and a class of similarly situated 

individuals against Simm for violating the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”). Specifically, Smith alleged 

Simm violated 15 U.S.C. § 1692g(a)(2) by failing to disclose the 

current creditor or owner of the debt. She further alleged the 

letter violates § 1692e because it is false, deceptive, or misleading. The court granted Smith’s motion to certify a class of 

similar persons in Wisconsin who received these same form 

letters between May 31, 2016 and June 21, 2017. Both parties 

moved for summary judgment; the district court granted 

Simm’s motion and denied Smith’s motion. It held the letter 

complies with § 1692g(a)(2) because it includes the name of 

the current creditor who owns the debt—Comenity Capital 

Bank—and provides further clarification for the unsophisticated consumer by also including “PayPal Credit,” so the 

debtor recognizes the debt. The court held that because there 

is nothing abusive, unfair, or deceptive about Simm’s letter, it 

does not violate § 1692e either. 

Simm also sent a collection letter to plaintiff-appellant 

Ruel Nieto dated March 29, 2017. The letter includes the same 

creditor and client information: 

CLIENT: PAYPAL CREDIT ORIGINAL CREDITOR: Comenity 

Capital Bank 

BALANCE: $4,588.42 ORIGINATION DATE: 04/11/2008 

It likewise informs Nieto she may request the name and address of the original creditor, if different from the current 

creditor. 

 

PayPal accounts; it paid merchants on their behalf, then sought repayment 

for the extension of credit.
4 Nos. 18-3350 & 19-1155 

Nieto, on behalf of a class of similarly situated individuals, 

sued Simm in the Northern District of Illinois on September 

22, 2017. She claimed Simm violated § 1692g(a)(2) of the 

FDCPA by failing to list the current creditor in the letter. Both 

parties moved for summary judgment. For the same reasons 

as in Smith’s case, the district court granted summary judgment for Simm and denied it for Nieto. 

Smith’s and Nieto’s appeals are consolidated before us 

now. 

II. Discussion 

The only question these appeals present is whether the 

form letters Simm sent Smith and Nieto identify the creditor 

to whom their debt is owed in a manner clear enough for an 

unsophisticated consumer to understand. We review a district court’s ruling on summary judgment de novo, examining 

the record and making all reasonable inferences in the light 

most favorable to the nonmoving party. Minerva Dairy, Inc. v. 

Harsdorf, 905 F.3d 1047, 1053 (7th Cir. 2018). 

Section 1692g(a)(2) of the FDCPA requires a debt collector 

to include “the name of the creditor to whom the debt is 

owed” in its initial communication to the debtor. 15 U.S.C. 

§ 1692g(a)(2). The statute does not specify any necessary terminology the letter must contain when identifying the creditor, but we require the information to be “clear[] enough that 

the recipient is likely to understand it.” Janetos v. Fulton Friedman & Gullace, LLP, 825 F.3d 317, 321 (7th Cir. 2016) (quoting 

Chuway v. Nat’l Action Fin. Servs., Inc., 362 F.3d 944, 948 (7th 

Cir. 2004)); see also Leonard v. Zwicker & Assocs., P.C., 713 F. 

App’x 879, 883 (11th Cir. 2017) (“[N]o bright-light rule requires a debt collector to always identify the creditor by its 
Nos. 18-3350 & 19-1155 5

full business name in order to avoid liability under § 1692g. 

Rather, ... a debt collector may use the creditor’s full business 

name, the name under which the creditor usually transacts 

business, or a commonly used acronym.” (internal quotation 

marks omitted)). We view potential FDCPA violations 

through the objective lens of an unsophisticated consumer 

who, while “uninformed, naïve, or trusting,” possesses at 

least “reasonable intelligence, and is capable of making basic 

logical deductions and inferences.” Pettit v. Retrieval Masters 

Creditor Bureau, Inc., 211 F.3d 1057, 1060 (7th Cir. 2000) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). 

There is no dispute that the debtors had PayPal accounts 

and that Comenity Capital Bank is the owner of the debt on 

those accounts. Debtors argue that listing Comenity Capital 

Bank as the “original creditor” and not “current creditor” is 

not clear enough to satisfy Janetos because consumers could 

infer the debt is currently owed to a different creditor than the 

“original” one. Simm responds that it complied with the language of the FDCPA by identifying Comenity Capital Bank as 

the creditor and that it further adhered to the spirit of the 

FDCPA by also disclosing the commercial name the consumer 

would be more likely to recognize—PayPal Credit. 

In Janetos, we reviewed a collection letter for compliance 

with § 1692g(a)(2). The collection letter included the name of 

the creditor but did not identify the entity as a creditor; rather, 

it identified the creditor, Asset Acceptance, LLC, as the “assignee” of a different company and stated the debtor’s account had been transferred “from Asset Acceptance, LLC, to 

Fulton, Friedman & Gullace, LLP.” Janetos, 825 F.3d at 321. 

Despite the debt collector’s argument that it implicitly disclosed the legal relationships between the identified parties, 
6 Nos. 18-3350 & 19-1155 

we observed that none of these statements identified who 

owned the debt clearly enough for a consumer to comprehend, and they left the recipients “to guess who owned the 

debt following the ‘transfer’ of the ‘account.’” Id. The lesson 

from Janetos is that even accurate technical terminology—

“transfer” or “assignee”—can be confusing to an unsophisticated consumer and can violate § 1692g(a)(2), which requires 

a debt collector to present information about the creditor and 

the debt in the manner the unsophisticated consumer can understand. 

That is precisely what Simm did here—the letter identifies 

a single “creditor,” as well as the commercial name to which 

the debtors had been exposed, allowing the debtors to easily 

recognize the nature of the debt. It is true the letter identifies 

Comenity Capital Bank as the “original” instead of “current” 

creditor. But the FDCPA does not require use of any specific 

terminology to identify the creditor. And the letter does not 

identify any creditor other than Comenity Capital Bank, 

which might have led to consumer confusion. Indeed, by informing debtors they could request the name of the original 

creditor if different from the current creditor, the letter alerts 

debtors the original and current creditor may be the same. 

As Simm explains, Smith’s and Nieto’s “position is that 

Simm’s letter, which was designed specifically to dispel confusion of the unsophisticated consumer, violates the FDCPA 

because it does not contain a word that is absent from the language of [the] statute, and which no court has ever determined must be contained in a collection letter.” We agree with 

Simm. Congress designed the FDCPA to “protect consumers 

from abusive and unfair debt collection practices.” Janetos, 835 

F.3d at 320. The letter provides a whole picture of the debt for 
Nos. 18-3350 & 19-1155 7

the consumer, identifying the creditor to whom the debt is 

owed as well as the commercial name the consumer is more 

likely to recognize. This provides clarity for consumers; it is 

not abusive or unfair and does not violate § 1692g(a)(2).2

III. Conclusion 

For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the judgments of the 

district courts. 

 

2 In the district court, Smith also claimed the letter is false, deceptive, 

or misleading in violation of § 1692e. She does not explicitly reassert that 

claim on appeal. We note that, for the same reasons we determined the 

letter provides clarity and a whole picture of the debt for the consumer in 

satisfaction of § 1692g(a)(2), it is not deceptive or misleading under 

§ 1692e.