Hi everyone I received the following letter from a CA after sending my first validation letter. Please read my response any feed back and or tips/pointers would be greatly appreciated. Letter from CA: We are in receipt of your certified letter there are a couple of issues with it. First the information you provide is insufficient to locate an account for you. I would need a complete acct number, and SSN. As we handle millions of accounts and your name is a commonone we areunable tolocate any info. Also we are a collection a~genQyif we placed something on your credit report we do not need your approval as you would owe a creditor that we represent. Your address also does not come up in our system either. It is your responsibility to update your creditors with your current address. While you dispute any debt we would need complete info to locate your account. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me. You are herby advised that this firm is acting pursuant to the Fair Debt Collection Practice Act, 15 U.S.C.A., Sec 1692 et seq.; and information obtained will be used for this purpose. My Response: I failed to understand the purpose of your letter (and I thought my request for validation was quite clear) ,you say that you cannot locate my information with the account number that I provided you, yet this is the account number your company provided and is listed in your trade line on my credit report with trans union. I recently called transunion to verify the account number and it is correct. Doesnâ??t it seem a little odd to you, that you canâ??t locate my account with your own account number (that you provided to transunion)? As for your request for my SSN, that is very private and sensitive information that I do not feel comfortable with (or intend on) giving to a company over an issue/account that is not valid and not mine. Therefore I (for the second time) request that you validate this debt by sending me a copy of the original contract or agreement to pay, whom ever it is that you are representing in this matter If you cannot or refuse to provide this information then I demand that you remove your information from my credit report immediately.
Good job Dst. However, once we give these people their opportunity to validate (per FDCPA), you are not required to give them a second chance when the first fails. At this point I would have simply demanded a deletion, within 5 days. (Per FTC v. PCM): California Debt Collection Agency Settles FTC Charges Of Fair Credit Reporting Act Violations The agreement also mandates the proper investigation of disputes. Where PCM learns during an investigation that account records no longer exist for a disputed debt, the company must delete the information from credit bureau files within five days. I'd copy the PCM case, write a demand for IMMEDIATE deletion, fax it first, and then hard copy by CRRR. Good luck.
Thanks Butch for the comments and suggestion,I'm still learning but I think I'm getting better,all you "guys" (and creditnet) are great!
Did you also dispute through the CRA, and did they verify it to them? In other words, can you show it is their mistake, not the CRAs mistake?
I just disputed with the CRA (the only one it's showing on) this morning and sent a letter (a little different than the one I posted because I noticed I left off a number at the end of the acct# perviously) to the CA via CRRR.So because of my mistake I'll await their response to this Validation to cover my butt just in case I need to pursue legal action down the line.
