Okay, folks, I won't go into details about the nature of my dispute except to say it has gone on for over 2 years now. Now it is in the hands of the infamous Midland Credit and they are behaving exactly as indicated on these boards. I sent a request for Validation to them on August 4th, 2004 Certified Mail RR. Never got any direct response but received two more similar bullish requests for money, one in which they emphasize, they are the SERVICER of the above mentioned Bank One (this debt was from a charged-off bank account). I just received a letter from Blatt, Hasenmiller, Leibsker & Moore LLC. "Demand is hereby made upon you for payment of amount due", etc. So what next? I was going to send the 2nd Validation request but now the law firm is involved. Please HELP!! This crap just prevented me from opening a new checking account. The pain has gone on too long.
First, you have to figure out whether these 'lawyers' are in fact real lawyers, who are licensed to practice law in your state, or are just a letterhead for loan which they are using to try to intimidate you into buckling. Irregardless of that, you should definately demand validation to the 'lawyers' to ensure that you are protecting your rights. The letterhead may give you a clue as to whether they are supposed to be licensed in your state, look for something which says something to the effect of admitted to (or member of) <your state's> bar. If none of their attorneys is licensed to practice in your state, then more than likely this firm itself can not escalate to the perceived threat of a lawsuit, which their letterhead coveys. The sole purpose of this is to scare you into thinking that since a lawyer is involved, I am going to be sued. Second thing to look for in the letter from the 'lawyers' was it really signed, or facsimile signed, or not signed at all? Unless it was physically hand-signed by the alleged attorney, then they are going to fight an uphill battle proving that even if the alleged lawyer who supposedly signed the letter is licensed to practice in your state, that they had sufficiently reviewed the file to the extent which the law requires.
They are licensed in Illinois. But they did not actually SIGN the letter. It merely says "thank you" followed by the names in the firm typed in. So are you suggesting I send the standard Validation letter or the post-30 days version? Should any other information be included? Also, they have called my work phone twice - I answered one call. The lady on their end said I had 30 days before they initiated something or other...I did not pay too much attention. From what I understand they don't even have the right to call me, correct?
They can notify you that they are filing suit, whether or not they have validated, or continue to collect by other means.
The only time they can't continue collection activities is from the minute after *THIS* agency, or attorney, has been demanded of it by you, validation of the debt, under your validation rights provided by the FDCPA, until the minute after they have obtained *AND* mailed the validation of the debt to you. You can as PD pointed out include a simple one sentence "Please provide all future communications by mail at the above address." to ask that phone communications be discontinued, you don't want to tell them to discontinue all contact unless you know for certain that the account is time-barred under your states laws.
Thanks you for your repsonse but I am still a bit confused. At this point which "letter" should I send to these lawyers? They keep calling, stating I have 30 days, etc. They have not sent validation of any kind. This is starting to get stressful! Scott
Re: Re: Midland Credit is sending Lawyers You have already sent the CA a validation letter and you have not received any validation? Did you send a letter to the law office requesting contact by mail only? If so then they have violated the law I would send a second validation request to the law office with copies of the first letter, and the cerified mail receipts, AND a request to contact you in writing ONLY. Also I would also mention that they have already violated provisions of the FDCPA and that you have a log showing the dates and times of their phone calls and what was discussed.
Re: Re: Midland Credit is sending Lawyers The first letter you send to anyone who is new to you (even if the debt has been disputed with another party) is a validation letter. You can add to that a request to only communicate in writing, because it protects your interests to have the paper-trail. Technically, each new company is considered to 'not know' what the previous companies status on the account was, so any time the account changes hands, you may need to start back at square one (either a regular validation letter, or a validation letter based on the Subsequent CA Strategy sample letter in the sample letters forum.) You need to think in terms of every CA as being different, even if the account was already in dispute with the CA before. Unless you've notified them that it was frozen by a previous validation request (Subsequent CA Strategy), you have no way of knowing that they were notified of the accounts status by the previous CA.
Re: Re: Midland Credit is sending Lawyers Okay, I sent the letter as advised on Sept. 23rd. I have received ZERO correspondence from the lawyers since then. no calls, no letters, nothing. Please advise of next step. Obviously, what needs to happen is this has to be removed from the reporting agencies. HELP!
Re: Re: Re: Midland Credit is sending Lawyers If they are continuing to report this then they have violated the FDCPA and owe you 1000$ for each CR that their TL appears on I would send them another letter by CMRRR stating that they have failed to validate this debt as required and have continued collection activity in violation of the FDCPA, and if they do not remove their TL from your CR's within 10 days, then you will be going to court to sue to collect statutory damages. Then, after 10 days sue them in small claims court!
