Two questions - I received a letter today from Creditmax Recoveries and all it was was a privacy notice explaining how they use and collect personal info. There is no mention of debt collection in the letter and I don't know who they are. Is this standard practice from collectors before they contact you with account numbers and demands? Secondly, it arrived in a window envelope where the return address clearly states CreditMax Recoveries. I thought the envelope couldn't be recognizable as coming from a debt collector?
Under banking disclosure laws, banks, insurance companies, CC companies, etc, are required to provide privacy disclosure letters to all consumers with which they have accounts, outlining what their privacy policies are regarding disclosure of your information, usually for marketting purposes, to other connected companies or other unrelated companies, and allow you to opt out of such disclosures. If you had a CC account with some original creditor, that creditor would have had to send you that notice. It is interesting that you are getting it from an apparent CA. It may mean that they have a charged off account in your name. Does the letter say it is from a debt collector, and any information may be used for that purpose? If not, they may consider that since it is a notice they are legally required to send under other federal laws, not for purposes of debt collection, they have no obligation to follow FDCPA rules with regard to it. Normally, the only disclosures of consumer debt information they could do would be for purposes of debt collection, or to sell a debt. I doubt if FDCPA would allow such disclosures solely for marketting purposes. The "You have an opportunity to settle this account by transferring it to a brand new credit card" offers are presumably made by the debt collector assigned or owning the account, not by them selling your info to some other CC company to market it to you, although I would expect they split some money if you do the deal. Is anything showing on your reports? Are you aware of having any charged off accounts? It would be interesting if some CA adopted this subterfuge as a way to fish for consumers they had not located, or established contact with.
Upon looking further it seems they are a debt seller, not a CA. http://www.creditmaxteam.com/debt_sellers.htm What that means to me I'm not sure. I have nothing on my credit reports from them but I do have three charge offs - 2 Capital One and one WAMU. They are being handled by NCO and Joseph Belzer respectively. Nothing in the letter references a debt/collection. I guess maybe one has been bought by CreditMax?
