When a CA has violated FDCPA rules (contacting a 3rd party about my debt), should I file a lawsuit in small claims court? Is there something in the archives here that covers it? (I've been gone awhile...) Thanks, Susanna
United Recovery Systems contacted our neighbor asking questions about who we are, where we live, were we at home, did we work at a specific place of employment (naming it) and the slime-ball CA left his name and telephone number and asked our neighbor to deliver the message to us to call him. This neighbor just moved in 5 months ago (we've lived here 11 years) and doesn't know us at all. Even though she told him that, he still persisted. This is very harrassing. BTW, I googled this CA and they were fined in 2002 by the Dallas FTC for $240,000 for sleazy practices, including unpermissable third-party contact, related to the Spanish-speaking population.
Here is the relevent section of the FDCPA 805 (b) http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fdcpa/fdcpact.htm#805 BUT, they are allowed to contact 3rd parties as outlined in FDCPA 804 : § 804. Acquisition of location information [15 USC 1692b] Any debt collector communicating with any person other than the consumer for the purpose of acquiring location information about the consumer shall -- (1) identify himself, state that he is confirming or correcting location information concerning the consumer, and, only if expressly requested, identify his employer; (2) not state that such consumer owes any debt; (3) not communicate with any such person more than once unless requested to do so by such person or unless the debt collector reasonably believes that the earlier response of such person is erroneous or incomplete and that such person now has correct or complete location information; (4) not communicate by post card; (5) not use any language or symbol on any envelope or in the contents of any communication effected by the mails or telegram that indicates that the debt collector is in the debt collection business or that the communication relates to the collection of a debt; and (6) after the debt collector knows the consumer is represented by an attorney with regard to the subject debt and has knowledge of, or can readily ascertain, such attorney's name and address, not communicate with any person other than that attorney, unless the attorney fails to respond within a reasonable period of time to the communication from the debt collector. " Review this carefully, along with any cases cited by other posters before you choose to file
Hiding, the location information excuse goes out the window when the CA has left messages on their answering machine, and still hasn't provided the notice of rights to the consumer. That along with asking the neighbor to carrier pigeon a message, when the FDCPA prohibits using any method which can be intercepted by a third-party, in this case they are handing the information to the third-party on a silver plater, knowing that they are a third-party. The FTC knew this or they wouldn't have taken action against them before for the same thing before.
She addressed that in two of her other threads about this same problem. Statring thread after thread about the same subject makes it hard to under stand the problem don't it. How can one offer decent advice when the poster jumps all the board confusing us with bits and pieces of info here there & everywhere?
