What are age-based fee surcharges
Age-based fee surcharges are additional percentage points added to the base success fee for debts that exceed certain age thresholds. These surcharges are defined in the Standard Debt Collection Agreement (SDCA), which all clients sign before submitting cases to the platform.
The surcharges are:
Debts older than 12 months: An additional 8 percentage points on top of the base success fee
Debts older than 24 months: An additional 15 percentage points on top of the base success fee
These surcharges are not cumulative with each other. A debt older than 24 months receives the 15-point surcharge only, not 23 points (8 + 15). The highest applicable bracket applies.
Why age-based surcharges exist
Debt age significantly affects the likelihood of successful recovery. As debts age, debtors may relocate, change contact information, experience further financial decline, or dispute the validity of older claims. Older debts typically require more intensive collection efforts, including additional skip tracing, debtor research, and outreach attempts.
The age-based surcharges compensate for the increased effort and resources required to recover older debts. This pricing structure maintains Debitura's no cure, no pay model while ensuring that collection partners are appropriately compensated for working on more challenging cases.
How debt age is calculated
The age of a debt is calculated from the original due date of the claim to the date of submission to Debitura. The calculation uses full calendar months.
A calendar month is considered complete when the submission date falls on or after the same numerical day of the following month. For example:
A debt due on January 15 becomes one month old on February 15
A debt due on March 31 becomes one month old on April 30 (or later)
The age threshold is evaluated at the moment of case submission. If a debt is 11 months and 29 days old at submission, no surcharge applies. If submitted two days later (at 12 months and 1 day), the 8-point surcharge applies.
How surcharges combine with base fees
Age-based surcharges are added on top of the standard success fee, which is determined by claim amount and jurisdiction (European or International). The final success fee is the sum of the base rate plus any applicable age surcharge.
Example calculation
Factor | Value |
Principal claim | $10,000 |
Jurisdiction | United States (International) |
Base success fee rate | 15% (for International claims $8,000 - $74,999) |
Age of debt | 26 months |
Age surcharge | +15 percentage points (debt older than 24 months) |
Total success fee rate | 30% (15% + 15%) |
Amount collected | $10,000 |
Success fee charged | $3,000 |
Multi-invoice age calculation
The standard age calculation described above uses the due date from a single invoice. A blended age uplift, which produces one proportional surcharge across several invoices of different ages, applies in two situations: when a case is submitted through one of Debitura's APIs with age-bucket data supplied alongside the claim, or when an assigned collection partner merges two or more existing cases into one. Age buckets are accepted on all of Debitura's case-creation APIs - the client API, the referral partner API, and the collection partner API's managed-case route. They are not available in the case-creation forms in the portals, so a case created through the web interface always prices from its single due date.
When a creditor submits multiple invoices against the same debtor directly, each invoice becomes an independent case with its own lifecycle, pricing, and communication thread. Each case is priced on its own principal amount and its own due date, so the standard single-invoice age calculation applies to each one.
The blended uplift is a weighted average based on the principal amounts that fall into each age bucket. The formula is:
Blended uplift = ((principal from 12–24 month invoices × 8) + (principal from 24+ month invoices × 15)) / total principal
The result is a proportional surcharge between 0 and 15 percentage points, rather than a fixed tier. When a blended uplift is provided, the platform uses that value directly as the age surcharge instead of calculating age from the due date.
Example
A case with €10,000 total principal has €5,000 from invoices in the 12–24 month range and €5,000 from invoices over 24 months old. The blended uplift is ((5,000 × 8) + (5,000 × 15)) / 10,000 = 11.5 percentage points. This produces a proportional surcharge that fairly represents the mixed ages, rather than applying a single fixed tier.
A case is priced this way only when it reached the platform through one of the two paths described above: an API submission that supplied the age bucket data, or a partner-side merge that recalculated pricing across the merged cases. When no age bucket data is provided and no merge has taken place, the standard single-invoice age calculation applies.
Impact by actor
Client
Pays a higher success fee when submitting older debts
Receives a smaller net recovery amount after the success fee is deducted
Can view the applicable success fee rate when submitting a case on the platform
Collection Partner
Receives higher compensation for working on older, more challenging cases
The age surcharge reflects the additional effort required for skip tracing, research, and outreach on aged debts
Referral Partner
Can submit bundled cases containing invoices of varying ages through the Referral Partner API - see API integrators below
API integrators (clients, referral partners, and managing partners)
Can submit a bundled case containing invoices of varying ages by supplying age-bucket data alongside the claim
For these bundled cases, the platform calculates a blended age surcharge based on the weighted age distribution of all invoices, instead of pricing from a single due date
Debitura
Applies age-based surcharges automatically based on the claim's due date and submission date
Calculates Debitura revenue share based on the total success fee (including surcharges)
SDCA precedence
The age-based fee surcharges described on this page are defined in the Standard Debt Collection Agreement. If anything on this page conflicts with the Standard Debt Collection Agreement, the SDCA is the legally binding source of truth.
Where to find this in the platform
Clients and collection partners can review the full terms of age-based surcharges in their signed agreements: