Posts Tagged ‘debt collectors’

I am teaching two continuing legal education seminars on consumer law in June. My presentations tend to be engaging (I don’t have the patience for boring presentations even when I am giving them), informative, and well-attended. Register early!

June 10th at 9 a.m. Offensive Defense: An Introduction to Protecting Consumers from Unscrupulous Debt Collectors, 1 hour [...]

Here are the blog posts I starred in Google Reader last week. (If you use Google Reader, you can subscribe to my shared items.)

The Alphonso Jackson Legacy. Mark Ireland comments on the Washington Post’s look at the legacy of HUD chief (and Bush appointee) Alphonso Jackson. While Jackson oversaw the government body in charge of [...]

My officemate, Pete Barry, was on the local Fox 9 News last night in a story about abusive debt collectors, especially one of his clients. The segment includes some of Pete’s “greatest hits” from his cases, including some pretty impressive language and threats.

You know who I’ll bet is really happy about the stimulus checks coming next month? Debt collectors. Tax refund is (usually) happy season for debt collectors, and this year they get two bites at the apple.

According to the FTC, consumer complaints about debt collection abuse were up significantly in 2007 (PDF link). This is hardly surprising, as debt has been plentiful and cheap lately. Complaints will almost certainly go up in 2008, since credit card borrowing is way up along with credit charge-offs.

Pursuant to the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, a debtor has 30 days after the first written communication from a debt collector to request validation of the debt. This form letter is a convenient form for requesting validation of the debt (PDF link). The form is a simple, fill-in-the-blank form. Keep a copy for yourself [...]

Debt collection is something that everyone has to deal with. Case in point: a debt collector just left a message on my mom’s answering machine, where I have not lived for eleven years. My credit report is squeaky clean–I just checked–but apparently there is another Sam Glover out there who has worse luck.
Every time you [...]

The AP reports that the lucky recipient of the “Dear SHIT FACE” letter is planning to sue Nationwide Collections next week. Nationwide’s excuse–”shit happens”–is not likely to hold up in court.
(As an aside, are the national media outlets allergic to citing their sources? This blog broke the story, but neither the AP/MSNBC nor ABC deigned [...]

Not compared with debt collectors in India, anyway.
Vinod Kumar was sitting in a friend’s car listening to the radio one evening last January when a stranger appeared, yanked him from the vehicle and beat him with an iron bar.
To collect a debt, that is. Here in the good ol’ USA, debt collectors still rely on [...]

The ACC representative in these calls says things like “I’ll go to any length I have to in order to embarrass you” and “the verification of your debt is that you paid it for two years.” Count the FDCPA violations, if you can!
Related:

Caveat Emptor playlist on YouTube