An acquaintance of mine has a scenario which is interesting. A CA got a judgment against her for $2400. She did appear in court but had no attorney and really did not know what was going on, basically because she's not an attorney! Along the way though, she started to become aware of the FDCPA. Enough to request that they not contact her by telephone, and she was able to document both this request and the subsequent phone contacts which they made after receiving this (before and after the judgment was entered.) She mentioned these violations to the CA's attorney, and now they are offering her to settle the account for $1100. Isn't this sort of odd? With the judgment in hand, couldn't they just get an order of withholding and get the entire $2400? (They know where she works....they've been calling her there repeatedly.) Is there some trickery here? Or is it harder than one might think to get withholding? Or are they running scared?
How many violations, or contacts by telephone, can your friend document? Your friend has also been contacted, at work, several times *after* the judgment has been entered? If there are numerous contacts, and your friend has solid documentation, there's no need to settle for a lesser amount. How many calls? Five? Ten? More? If there are literally several calls, your friend should take their documentation to an attorney who has knowledge or advanced knowledge of the FDCPA and FCRA. Your friend needs an attorney.
They may very well want to "settle" for $1100, given the risk that she might contact an attorney before settling, and obtain damages including attorney's fees offsetting their judgement. Does she know how to ensure that they properly notify the court that the judgement has been satisfied? If they are unethical (and what else do FDCPA violations imply?), without representation, they might accept her money, she thinks it's settled, and they might still sell the balance of the judgement to a new CA, which if she had no documentation of the agreement, could still proceed to enforce the judgement, with now no offsetting liability for illegal collection to interfere with their actions. If this happens 1 year down the road, past the point when she can even sue them for their FDCPA violations, they are home free, with no more liability for their actions. Since the judgement probably has a life of 10 years (depends on state law), between her payment, and their proceeds from sale of the judgement, they might collect close to what they would have for enforcing their judgement.
