When debt collectors go too far

Privacy Rights Clearinghouse ^ | August 24, 2004 | Brytani

[Brytani]

With all the recent news stories of debt collectors landing in prison or being taken out of business for illegal and strong arm tactics, I thought i'd share with my fellow Freepers a great resource to help if you ever have to deal with a scumbag debt collector.

http://www.privacyrights.org/fs/fs27-debtcoll.htm

This link has resources to use if dealing with collection agencies/collectors, your rights, links to the FTC, sample letters and more.

I hope this is helpful to some Freepers who've been hounded rightly or wrongly by this pretty much unregulated billion dollar a year industry.

[JavaTheHutt]

How petty do you have to be to ruin someones credit for 38 cents!!!!!

Maybe you should contact them and attempt to work out a payment plan. I think 38 months would be appropriate.

[Texas Tea]

Bay Area Credit is TERRIBLE!!!

They are a company that buys debt from another, usually for pennies on the dollar. The debt that you thought that you owed to a hospital or company is then owed to...Bay Area Credit!

They come after you tooth and nail for nothing less than the full amount because they now own your debt.

Talking to the original company won't do any good because they have now been paid off by Bay Area Credit.

If you can get past the India contingency making the calls and answering their phones, you're lucky, and you can never talk to one of their managers, they refuse to pass your call to one.

[JavaTheHutt]

It really bugs my ass when somebody calls a spelling error a grammar flaw. ;-)

It really bugs my ass two. :)
Yes, the use of 'two' was intentional.

[packrat35]

Change your phone number. Make it unlisting. Best advise I ever got.

[5Madman2]

Ping for later

[Republican Red]

My business is in a battle with UPS over a huge bill. I have a lawyer handling it now. UPS sicked a credit collector "NCO" on it. We have gotten the cease and desist letter and lo and behold we have been getting calls nonstop froma real shaddy outfit called Risk Management Alternatives. A quick google search supplied me with most the info I needed. Seems NCO bypasses all the laws in the book by farming out some of there work. This outfit follows no rules or regulations and is real slimey.

[JavaTheHutt]

If you have caller ID why do you even answer the call? I just let those kind ring or if I feel mischevious I'll take the phone off the hook and let it sit for a while.

Naw, you need to get a portable cd player to keep by the phone. Load up one of those learn to speak a foreign language type cds to play for them when they call, lay the phone down with the mouthpiece right by the speaker and walk away.

[packrat35]

Change your phone number and make it unlisted.

[Brytani]

I sent them 38 cents in pennies with a VERY nasty letter telling them to take it off my credit report immediately and sent a copy to the doctors office asking them if he he was petty he'd let his billing company hurts peoples credit for 38 cents.

Haven't heard back from either of them yet.

Don't know if they'll do it but it made me feel better....

[Brytani]

Great...well next step will be a lawsuit if they don't stop calling.

What gets me is that my mother-in-law is and has been completely disabled for a few years now, she gets disability, Medicare and Medicaid, she shouldn't have any bills owed to anyone.

She's been talking to dead people, aliens and FBI agents for the last year, wouldn't know what a credit card was on a good day and hasn't been into a store to buy anything in at least 3 years.

I have no clue what "bill" they're even calling about, they'll harass the hell out of me every morning but won't give me any details on the bill. They tell me it's private!!

Real scumbags......

[Brytani]

I honestly thought about doing that but it's SUCH a PITA. Only at last resort will I take that step.

[Brytani]

Do a search on NCO on the FTC website, I'm almost positive they were fined BIGTIME and almost put out of business last year for violations of the fair debt collections act.

What makes things worse is that it's illegal for a company to collect or send out to a collection agency any disputed bill, yet they do it all the time!!!!

[Brytani]

I'm answering because I'm taping the conversations in case I end up in court with these people.

I'm taping one full week of daily phone calls and so far they've called every day this week. After I get Friday mornings conversation taped, I'll quit answering.

However, if they are like most collection agencies, they'll change their call-out number, what the caller ID reads or block their number from showing up so you don't know who's calling.

[Brytani]

Hey, check this out!!!

---

CONSUMER ABUSE ALERT

---

For Release: May 13, 2004
NCO Group to Pay Largest FCRA Civil Penalty to Date

One of the nation’s largest debt-collection firms will pay $1.5 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) by reporting inaccurate information about consumer accounts to credit bureaus. The civil penalty against Pennsylvania-based NCO Group, Inc. is the largest civil penalty ever obtained in a FCRA case.

According to the FTC’s complaint, defendants NCO Group, Inc.; NCO Financial Systems, Inc.; and NCO Portfolio Management, Inc. violated Section 623(a)(5) of the FCRA. The law specifies that any entity that reports information to credit bureaus about a delinquent consumer account that has been placed for collection or written off must report the actual month and year the account first became delinquent. In turn, this date is used by the credit bureaus to measure the maximum seven-year reporting period the FCRA mandates. The provision helps ensure that outdated debts – debts that are beyond this seven-year reporting period – do not appear on a consumer’s credit report. Violations of this provision of the FCRA are subject to civil penalties of $2,500 per violation.

The FTC charges that NCO reported accounts using later-than-actual delinquency dates. Reporting later-than-actual dates may cause negative information to remain in a consumer’s credit file beyond the seven-year reporting period permitted by the FCRA for most information. When this occurs, consumers’ credit scores may be lowered, possibly resulting in their rejection for credit or their having to pay a higher interest rate.

NCO is so bad, that in 2003, they have been sued 40 times for violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). These suits are usually filed when consumers are abused in violation of state and federal debt collection laws.

NCO is a money-mill, gobbling up competitors, buying portfolios of old debts for pennies, and expanding globally. These money-beggars are making their bottom-line profits at the expense and abuse of consumers.

One wonders how many lawsuits are NOT being filed because consumers do not know their rights or that NCO CAN be held accountable for their illegal debt collection practices.

Apparently, NCO is not spending enough time and money to properly train their debt collectors in accordance with law, the FDCPA. Do they hire any derelict that may be in-between court and treatment dates simply to harass, abuse, and oppress consumers? There is no mention of drug testing at their web site, so can you be hired at NCO if one has bad habits and a need for fast-cash. This must be a 'dream-job' for anyone with a prison record, drug habit, or any con artist out to defraud some fast money off unsuspecting consumers. Are you aware of the personal consumer information these money beggars have access to? I shudder to think how much information is being illegally used at agencies such as NCO. You should be VERY nervous about the type of individuals who have this unprecedented and open access to ALL of your personal information.

It may be just a matter of time until collectors start calling with accents from country's like India, Pakistan and ....(ooohhh my gawd!!)

NCO's CEO, Michael J. (kinky) Barrist seems to be astonishing Wall Street (NASDAQ:NCPM) with his financial wizardry. He certainly appears to be pumping up the bottom line. (One lawsuit at a time?) In my experience, this type of greed and consumer abuse will catch up with NCO, just as it did with Commercial Financial Systems (CFS) and Outsourcing Solutions Inc (OSI). Both operations were out of control just prior to their filing for bankruptcy protection. CFS's top brass is facing federal criminal charges in highly anticipated court proceedings scheduled for later this year.

If you are receiving abuse from NCO, contact me for referral to a local consumer law professional in your area. NCO, with $800+million in revenues last year, has more money than a South American drug cartel, so use the law to make them pay when they violate the laws and your consumer rights.

Do not let NCO's under-trained, uneducated and FDCPA lacking debt-collectors make a paycheck at your expense.
Big agencies pay big salaries to their ego-driven brass. NCO should spend a lot more time training their collectors and dealing with consumer complaints, in this case BIGGER does NOT mean BETTER! (Except for Kinky and his top brass team of money beggars)

www.budhibbs.com

[Brytani]

FReepers are great.

I never thought I'd recommend someone more then Dave Ramsey, but after reading through Bud Hibb's website, he's coming in pretty high on my recommendation list.

Between Ramsey and Hibb's, no consumer should ever be in debt again, have a problem with collectors, not know how to invest their money or every live paycheck to paycheck again. And I learned about both from FReepers.

[deport]

Well I guess each one uses a phone differently and handles it differently as to how they let it rule their life. Take care.

[MadLibDisease]

Spell checking is the last refuge for those that feel inferior.

[packrat35]

Its not that big a deal. Best $25 dollars I ever spent. One phone call to the phone company and I had a new number.

[KoRn]

"Y'all are bugging my ass, and he asked me to ask you to stop. ;)"

Dammit! Worst of all, the one thing that is just the Mother of All Ass Buggings is when someone's ass is bugged because my ass got bugged over someone else's ass getting bugged over another guy's ass got bugged. Dear God, heaven help us all!

[martin gibson]

do you know what really burns my ass..?

a grass fire about this high (holds hand palm down about waist height)...