Many state governments have online access to licensing. GOOGLE: collection agency license (your state) - you may have to do some hunting (I did even though I have a state license and use the DLLR site - it was over in Financial Regulation).
One of my CA was removed because they weren't licensed (didn't say that but they aren't, reporting them to the AG anyway); another failed to provide proof of licensing (they are though) so I am going to the OC for that one with the intro that they failed to validate fully.
