Portfolio Recovery Associates is a debt purchaser.  They acquire default accounts from original credit issuers.  Once they own the obligation they can engage in any lawful collections efforts, including phone calls, letters, lawsuits, and post Judgment activities such as wage garnishment and bank attachment.

Portfolio is owned by the PRA Group, a publically traded company.  In 2022 they acquired $850 million ($850,000,000.00) in default accounts, collected $1.7 billion ($1,700,000,000.00) from debtors, and generated a net profit in excess of $117 million ($117,000,000.00).  At the conclusion of that year they owned about $5.7 billion ($5,700,000,000.00) in outstanding balances, which is equivalent to around 5% of all credit card debt nationwide. 

The benefit to an original credit issuer in selling to Portfolio is that they derive some value in exchange for a non-paying account.  Meanwhile, Portfolio generates a profit by successfully collecting sums from debtors that exceed their operational costs.  So given their scale, Portfolio serves a substantial role in the default collections industry.