# Otto Academy

> Free courses on how creditor-side debt collection actually works, for people who have just started at a collections law firm. No account, no sign-up.

- Source: https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/
- Publisher: Otto — https://ottoforfirms.com
- Updated: 2026-09-01

Free courses on how creditor-side debt collection actually works. No account, no sign-up.

- [Collections 101](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/) — The life of a debt, from the bank that charged it off to the money going back. Written for someone who started at a collections law firm this week and has never seen how any of it fits together. · 11 lessons · about 165 minutes
- [Using Otto](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/using-otto/) — How a firm runs on Otto, from first sign-in onward — setting up users and clients, the daily work, litigation and the money, and where the audit file comes from. · 13 lessons · about 140 minutes · passphrase required

## Every lesson in Collections 101

- [Where the debt comes from](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/where-the-debt-comes-from/) — Charge-off, placement and purchase — the three events that decide who owns the account on your screen and what your firm is allowed to do with it. (14 min)
- [What a placement actually is](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/what-a-placement-is/) — A placement is a contract, a data file and a set of standards you will be measured against. This is what is inside one and what each part governs. (15 min)
- [Who does what at a collections firm](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/who-does-what-at-a-firm/) — A small legal core on a large operating floor: collectors, supervisors, paralegals, attorneys, compliance, the mailroom, and ops — and the doctrine that decides where the line sits. (15 min)
- [The mailroom](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/the-mailroom/) — Everything that arrives — post, fax, email, portal uploads — lands here, and some of it has to stop work on an account within hours. This is why the mailroom is a compliance function and not a post room. (16 min)
- [Outbound calling](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/outbound-calling/) — Attempts, contacts and conversations are three different things. How an outbound operation is actually structured, and the rules that shape it. (16 min)
- [Inbound calls](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/inbound-calls/) — The consumer called you. That changes the tempo, the risk and what has to happen in the first thirty seconds. (14 min)
- [Skip tracing: finding the right person](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/skip-tracing/) — What skip tracing is, the data vendors firms actually run — TLOxp, Accurint, Experian, idiCORE, CLEAR — the waterfall, and the FCRA line that decides what permission a lookup needs. (14 min)
- [Disputes, and what stops collection](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/disputes-and-what-stops-collection/) — Six things a consumer can do that change what your firm may do next — what each one stops, and for how long. (17 min)
- [Suit and judgment](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/suit-and-judgment/) — What has to be true before an account can be filed on, what the court process looks like at volume, and what a judgment is actually worth. (16 min)
- [What happens in the courtroom](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/a-day-in-court/) — The morning docket with dozens of collection cases on it, the hallway where most of them resolve, what a default judgment actually requires, and how a judgment becomes money. (16 min)
- [The money coming back](https://ottoforfirms.com/academy/collections-101/the-money-coming-back/) — Payments arrive, sit in trust, and are remitted to the client. Every part of that is regulated, reconciled and audited. (14 min)

## About Otto

Otto publishes this reference and builds the software underneath it: case management for US creditor-side collections law firms, where a client's written rules run before an action is taken rather than in next month's report.

- [Talk to us](https://ottoforfirms.com/contact/)
- [See what it costs](https://ottoforfirms.com/pricing/)

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This is an informational reference, not legal advice, and using it creates no attorney-client relationship. Limitations periods turn on facts this page cannot know — which state's law governs, the contract type, when the claim accrued, and whether anything tolled or revived it. Confirm against the primary source and your own counsel before acting.