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How Debt Collection Operatives Work: Are You Getting Harassed By Illegal Practices

In Credit Repair of CreditGuru (August 8, 2024 11:01 pm)

I'm sure you've heard the whine…

“I’ve got too much month left at the end of my money.”

It’s very common nowadays. And many folks aren't only feeling the pinch of the bad economy, but many of us are also feeling the heat of bill collectors on our backs.

Yes times are troublesome. Many of us have lost our jobs and if not, many of us have lost our hope in our money futures. We feel stress and tension in our lives every day.

But whether or not you haven't lost your job, it just appears like our money does not go as far. We appear to work much harder with far less to show for it.

The final analysis is it is easy to not be able to pay on our mortgage or our electric bill, or definitely those visa cards that just seem to never go away. It feels like we're continually overwhelmed by the spectre of bills that are late or simply never get paid.

At some point the “you know what” hits the fan and we have bill collectors breathing down our backs. It happens to the best of us.

But you have rights. There are certain things those bill collectors and collection agencies are not allowed to do. There’s laws out there to guard you. The most important one is the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA).

This bill, made by Congress in 1978 as Title VIII of the Consumer Credit Protection Act, is designed to control how bill collectors and collection attorneys, or any entity that attempts to collect bad debt, can act when trying to collect debts.

Really the FDCPA outlines a debt recovery operative as “any person who uses any instrumentality of interstate commerce or the mails in any business the principal purpose of which is the collection of any liabilities, or who continually collects or tries to collect, directly or loosely, liabilities owed or due or announced to be owed or due another.”

Pretty broad but again this bill is intended to defend you, the average joe, who turns out to be going thru one of the most difficult money ages in recent history. As Bruce Springsteen sings, “Some day we’ll look back on this and it will all seem funny.” I sure hope so… But I have my doubts.

It is not funny to businesses that buy bad debt and then go out to collect those liabilities. They take it seriously and some go too far and use strategies that are not only honest-to-goodness mean but that are unlawful. Things like:

calling at all hours of the night (illegal)
claiming they are credit reporting agencies (illegal)
claiming you will be arrested if you do not pay (illegal)
misrepresenting the amount you owe (illegal)
using profane or filthy language (illegal)

Companies Can Get Sued For Illegal Practices

West Asset Management, a national collections company out of Omaha, must pay a record $2.8 million settlement to settle FTC charges that they repeatedly violated the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. They were discovered to be using methods like…

Calling consumers numerous times every day
Used insulting and rude language to customers on the telephone
Outright lied to consumers by saying they would go to jail for their debts.
Made withdrawals from the bank accounts of clients without obtaining permission for the charges beforehand.
In a number of cases West Asset Management even pursued shoppers for liabilities that did not belong to them while using these tactics.

The point is, you really ought to know the law and protect yourself from voracious collection practices. If you find that you are being pestered by collectors it may be clever to contact a good attorney that concentrates on debt protection. They can get those collection companies off your back and help relieve the stress of these tough business times we are in… At least for a while.

Rick Hart is a web business advisor. He provides tools for foreclosure barristers in Tampa that help with debt collection issues, insolvency and repos.