Harassing calls from a debt collector? Here is what you need to know

"This number" has its own dedicated thread on 800Notes where your specific remarks frankly belong.

So you have a third party spoofing the hospital and the so-called bill was a phantom debt. I partly agree with Elle. You were wasting your time, on playing the obnoxious squeaky wheel and harassing the hospital staff, which did not exert direct control over the Texas agency, your actual enemy. You had two good FDCPA violations or more, and you squandered your chance at payback to favor prank phone calls which emulate the worst tendencies of debt collectors. So you get no damage award and the Texas clods went unpunished. Way to go, chief.

} caller id says Readers mag. ....  made multiple reports to my phone company and still nothing has been done!!

One, your remarks belong in the specific number thread. Two, that thread concerns either illegal sales or advance fee fraud, and not consumer debt collection.

I don't know what you expected your phone carrier to do, absent a call blocking method. Your real problem is with the call source, which can change numbers like socks.

} My husband has a judgment against him and the judge told the people we have no money and no assets. We keep getting letters from the attorney. How long can this go on?

The rest of his natural life. You may be collection-proof today. Next week your rich gramma could die and leave a fortune. You notice that judgments can last initially for a couple decades, and they often get renewed. The moment you obtain a nickel they can legally cadge, it's gone, which is rather the point of securing a judgment. It's the next best thing to debtor's prison, done via house arrest.

The FDCPA fortunately protects you post-judgment. You watch those letters and sift any collection phone calls. Monitor bank accounts for wrongful seizure. The plaintiff's lawyer may screw up somewhere and give you a weapon to fight with. For all I know, the judgment itself was obtained fraudulently. See, lack of money is not a defense in court. At best it's a buffer. Your defense is composed (mainly) of wrongdoing by your opponent. You wrap your head around that and you'll be in a better mindset to weigh your options.

} If the debt is genuine, offer to pay it of [sic] at an affordable amount each week. ... I used to collect many debts  every week and did it by a friendly, approach
Well, yippee for you of the silent minority. Maybe you haven't noticed the hundreds of collection agencies represented on this website alone who are populated by petty crooks and felons. Many of them extend a handshake on the right and conceal a knife in the left hand. Sorry to say, a lot of them are chasing "genuine" accounts, but feel that lies and hustling get them paid faster. My best wins in court were cases where at first glance "the debt was genuine" but its collectors weren't. This among many, many reasons is why Congress gave us all a right to dispute collectors and spank them for jerking with us. This is why the first reflex cannot be to worry about payment plans but instead to plan for conflict and payback.

} Eleven states require the consent of every party
Ten whole years ago, DD knew something which you missed. "All party" consent is implied by the "recorded for quality assurance" disclaimer. This at least is the frequent finding in case law. All parties know there is a recording or a chance of one, removing expectation of privacy. Also of note, Federal law favors "single party", and it can take a lot of work to succeed on a Wiretap Act claim in cases of consumer fraud, where victims are recording only to protect themselves and not for some blackmail plot.

} Theirs [sic] a time frame of 2 yrs to file a lawsuit against you, after that the debt will stay on your credit standing for 6 yrs, goodluck [sic] ride it out.
Chalk up another response to no one which cites no known law and is dangerously inaccurate and vague for all American readers.

} you dont [sic] ever have to pay the collection people make your payments directly to the people owed they cant [sic] refuse your payment
Okay, thanks for the run-on non-sentence with no related prior discussion. I've been over this many times, so I'll try a short version.

1)  Not all debts are valid and not all collection is honest, which flattens out all desire to pay and inspires FDCPA lawsuits.
2)  "The collection people" have made their clients sign a contract which prevents the end-run which all you "pay the creditor" cheerleaders endorse. No matter who takes your money, the third party is getting its cut.
3)  "The people owed" may not be owed, see #1. The issue is more confused when debts are sold to the junk market. The lender has made its sale and doesn't want your money. The debt buyer likely cannot prove the claim, which leads naturally to lawbreaking collection tactics. Why you'd volunteer payment at that point is a mystery.

If you're all through with your tantrum to justify apathy, I won't belabor the several ways you're wrong. I will suggest that you're "disgusted" with the breed of bogus collectors who infest Buffalo, Corona, Atlanta, and southern Florida and make themselves difficult to find for law enforcement. This problem of secrecy did not stop, for instance, the legendary Diana Mey from bagging a 10.8-mil judgment against some of the worst such actors a few years ago.

} The FDCPA is another joke that puts all the responsibility on the innocent and I am very doubtful that you would ever be able to collect
Fine then. Doubt all you like and suffer in ignorance. That leaves more money for me to collect from scofflaws, I guess. I'm up five figures against the bad actors so far, and no lawyers helping me. I had one buffoon this year offer me 4k to drop my case, which I refused because it was insultingly low. If the law is a joke, I'm laughing on my trip to the bank.

} Our government and our legal agencies are just pawns
Yes, yes, gub-mint does nothing, further justifying your doing nothing. The records of the CFPB, FTC, and DoJ say otherwise. If you're not satisfied with their efforts, try joining the fight instead of throwing mud in your sandbox.

Mel from ten long years ago was quite vague, not saying who "they" are, and we don't know that a real "creditor" was involved. Your response is mostly correct but may be misplaced. Now to sand the edges:

} If it's truly a collection agency, then your creditor has already written off the debt as a loss. Then these accounts are sold to these agencies ...
Well, charge-offs don't dissolve a contract, and a "true" collection agency can be working for an original creditor as easily as a junk debt buyer. The JDB collectors don't have their "papers" and are allergic to legal compliance, and are therefore easier to defeat. An agency working assigned accounts can turn to the mother ship for proof of claim. Sometimes people get lucky and find the OC has discarded old records. Other banks hang onto documents next to forever.

} You must first acknowledge to them that you are recording and if they consent
Not necessary in about three-quarters of US states. There are ways around the "all party" rules in the remainder. It's been discussed here previously. In general I would record anywhere to protect myself and have raw material for law enforcement. Doesn't mean I'll use or disclose the recording, but if I get static for either I'll argue case law and the intent of the Wiretap Act and let a judge decide.

How can one be sure that the "collection agency" is actually acting on behalf of the original creditor? or that it actually bought the debt from the original creditor? Can one demand a letter from the original creditor naming this collection agency as working on their behalf, or as having purchased the debt?

Someone kept calling my phone from a debt collection outfit.  I finally called them back, because they were the same company using a myriad of different numbers--it didn't help to block their calls.  When I finally talked with someone there, the woman said it was likely they found a number "similar" to someone who owed them money.  Boy did she get a piece of my mind. I told her she was harassing my family and we did not want them to call our home phone, or we would be contacting our attorney. After that did not receive further calls.

After we moved into our new home, we kept getting calls from an agency looking for the former owners.  They would call at various hours, even in the early morning and late late evening--which I have since heard is illegal.  Finally one day I answered the phone, and the woman said the first name of the woman who lived in the house before us.  I replied, "My name is Lenore, and I have lived in this house for five years.  If you continue call here, I am going to report you.  You are harassing us--and we have nothing to do with the people you are looking for.   She hurriedly apologized.  Never heard from them again.

They were calling to collect money from my son.  I told them to contact God because he had passed away and no longer lived on this earth.  They couldn't get off the phone soon enough.

You can demand any letter you like. You can also demand a Shetland pony and a pearl necklace. Doesn't mean you're entitled to those things.

If vetting an assigned collection account means so much to you, the OC could be contacted by a means which that creditor publicizes, and you are likely to get an honest answer. The OC and its hired gun have a service agreement; neither have a good reason to lie about it.

Junk debt gets more messy, in multiple ways, since the chain of title tends to weaken with each resale. The OC might tell you who first bought an account, but naturally is not going to track subsequent assignments or resales. The lender sold your account to quickly rid itself of a problem child and gains nothing from any "service after the sale". The junk debt buyers are for various reasons not to be trusted as informants. Their data degrade as accounts are trafficked, and they are more motivated to fudge and lie to get paid.

Probably you're aware that your concern is partly covered by the §1692g initial dunning letter. The collector must supply a true creditor name in your notice. For junk debt that creditor will be the name of the buyer, in which case nobody is obliged to retrace to the OC for you. Maybe you don't believe what's printed there. You've a right to reasonable suspicion.

If you're not satisfied with results of friendly inquiry, I'm afraid you'd have to be in litigation and cleared to serve discovery on your opponents for company files which answer your question. Those may of course be roped off as "privileged business records" and/or deemed irrelevant.

I'd be remiss to overlook something I've stressed for years on complaint websites. Despite any myth promoted by company shills who purportedly "called the bank to verify" collection, the paper chasing is not legally or practically the alleged debtor's problem. Everywhere in our laws, the one who brings the claim carries the burden of proof. You may have your reasons for the gumshoe work, but the effort should do nothing to invoke your FDCPA rights.