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

Go to www.eBay.com and buy a phone call blocker.  Cheap and easy to use.  Some block up to 1,500 phone calls.  Once they call and are blocked, that is it, no more calls. Stopped.

Look at this one:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Pro-Incoming-Call-Te ... nQAAOSwDfxa6Xi3

and free shipping.

Let's return to page one and the premise of this thread. It discusses confrontation with debt collectors. It advises that we learn our FDCPA rights and use them. It specifically promotes the solving of our problems hands-on, like grownups. It doesn't say anything about plugging in a Chinese call blocker and hiding under a blanket until the calls stop. What will you tell your relatives, neighbors, employers, ex-lovers, former teachers, et al when the pursuer sprays them with a few dozen skip trace calls apiece? You're buying them all call blockers too?

Call blocking does not equal "no more calls, stopped". Otherwise we would name the action something other than a "block". The unwanted calls are still coming like stones hurled at the gate, because maintaining the barrage is almost cheaper than ceasing fire. Waiting around weeks and months for debt collector calls to pause and resume as they wish is not a strategy. Big-name junk debt collectors have no incentive to stop pestering you and everyone in your circle until you give them a reason which triggers a legal requirement.

Your punching bag of the week MCM is a highly visible domestic company with a street address. You I am sure can locate paper and ink. You combine those with USPS Certified labels to make the agency legally bound to obey your demands, whether that's to "put up or shut up" through validation or limit the means of contact or silence the noise entirely. The total cost remains much less than any call blocker on the market and you don't have to wait for a delivery truck to get started. Depending on how the collector reacts, your reward is either regained peace or a fat check paid to you for disobeying your notice. When was the last time your call blocker paid you damage awards?

Ignoring the issue is exactly the reaction MCM and other junk debt buyers want. Their plan is to sue anyone who looks easy to roll for a few grand. No other category of nuisance caller holds such a contractual power. Alleged debtors who leverage the FDCPA tend to choke off the autodialed calls and greatly reduce their chances of being sued and slapped with judgments. More critically, they preserve more of their own rights for the long term. You won't like this part, but a hunted person must answer and handle at least some of the calls to positively connect violations to their source. Otherwise one has only guesswork and hearsay for tools. People who ignore calls, delete messages, and trash letters will have no evidence of lawbreaking and thus no ammunition when the JDB sues and/or when named as Defendant.

Also, I am reasonably sure that the average 800Notes user has in fact learned something of Caller ID blocking methods. Comments referencing them and the act of blocking threaten to eclipse all others, contrary to the stated mission of this website. I think we have one or two forum threads where discussion of particular hardware and software is tolerated. Elsewhere product recommendations are treated like spam, regardless of intent.

I have been informed that I have a collection placed upon me. I have received several call over a period of 12 - 15 years from different collection agencies. How many agencies do I need to respond to when all are offering different settlement amounts for a bill I did not create and refuse to pay?

I'll need to make some assumptions about what you have left unclear. I read this to mean that several collectors in series have made a play for the same account, probably junk debt that's been passed around like a hackysack. The prior failure of one, three, or seven agencies to collect won't stop Schmuck Number 8 from trying again.

To best preserve your rights you respond to each initial dunning as it arrives, whether that response is "please validate", "quit calling my workplace", or "go jump in a lake". Sadly the transient commodity nature of junk debt means that the problem is truly never settled even when you "settle". These things have been made very cheap to pursue and easy to collect in court from the ninety-some percent of people who don't respond at all. For as long as we breathe the approach is "lather, rinse, repeat" when new chuckleheads are chasing ever-aging debts. If not for the possible burden of defending a collections lawsuit, the "zombies" could be safely ignored.

So that's the broad policy answer. The brass tacks fall on the actual age of your alleged debt, which unless it was already reduced to a judgment should be a stale claim in every state. It should be quite safe to write, on real paper, to the current debt collector a simple notice of refusal to pay. Many agencies forget what that triggers in the FDCPA. The correct responses are to drop the matter quietly or sue you. The latter option prompts you to rain down the hurt from your own FDCPA countersuit. The former option, when ignored, also gives you cause to sue them just for being ignorant jerks. As it is, your story says that the collection activity has no reasonable basis, which puts every collector on thin ice from the outset.

It's really amusing to be asked to "settle" something which you can easily get dismissed in court if you're illegally sued. There is growing (and disputed) case law saying that it's deceptive practice to even make the "settlement" offer on time-barred debts, one of the many circuit splits the CFPB is ready to address in proposed revisions of the FDCPA.

I would suggest contacting Lexington Law. They help with credit repair and getting things off of people's credit report. I was successful in getting a couple things removed and my credit score went from a 451 to 668 within a matter of several months. They have various rates depending on the type of service you need. They also will be the ones who will be sending all of the appropriate letters and track down the physical addresses to the debt collectors to properly serve them with the cease and desist letters needed.

Okay, one more time for everyone who missed it last month, the subject of the article leading this thread discusses confrontation with debt collectors. It does not discuss credit report revision or FCRA rights or anything like that beyond cautioning us that bad tradeline entry can be a form of retaliation for disputing a debt.

Now to the glory of Lexington Law, a service of such exalted reputation that for a dozen years or more their minions have spammed complaint sites like this one with all manner of glowing testimonials. Verily, they are truly heroes to the distressed consumers who were illegally pounced upon soon after being denied credit. This was not keen insight or magic but predatory marketing informed by snooping on credit report changes. Maybe to reinforce the old saw about leopards and their spots, Lex was sued five months ago by the CFPB for charging upfront fees and making false promises to win new customers.

This is of course to say that John Heath's operation is no different from the other credit fixer rackets which have come, gone, and rebranded. They promise the moon and send fees into orbit for services which an individual can perform FOR FREE and usually with greater competence. Any damned fool can goose a FICO score by pelting the credit reporting agencies with frivolous disputes. But soon the apology for an "investigation" via E-OSCAR ends and at best the score reverts to "normal". At worst, the credit report is left in a bigger mess than ever. Anyway, all that effort is too often hurled at the lesser problems which follow poor cash flow, like repainting a car door before its crushes and dents have been repaired.

Really if all there was to FDCPA enforcement was issuing "cease and desist letters", the CFPB's proposed rule changes wouldn't run on for half a mile like they do. I would be very worried about what's being sent in my name from a form letter paper mill like Lexie, and consider it quite hazardous to surrender control of the simplest things I can do to preserve my consumer rights.

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Files Suit Against Lexington Law, PGX Holdings, and Related Entities

no, it is not legal

Twelve solid years later, the six dozen-plus responses to Jennifer's conveniently found front page remarks have apparently not settled the matter to the public satisfaction, prompting your thorough evaluation and considered response within nine seconds on your lunch break.

examples of replies from the prior 20 months:
26 Apr 2018, Rick - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... 654320756019251
05 Jun 2018, Wolf - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... 277157401478634
24 Jul 2018, GW - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... 948144557897207
07 Nov 2018, Been There - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... -know?page=c293
15 Apr 2019, Harry B - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... 300319300255074

my own contributions, after it became apparent that kneejerk replies would never end:
12 Jan 2018 - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... 451698567833287
12 May 2018 - https://800notes.com/arts/harassing-calls-fro ... 773963179839972

I have a Georgia number and I get calls at 6 am too. Just report it! And keep blocking the calls. I've blocked alot of [***] calls and I dont get as many.

My son got tired of a bill collector calling his house looking for me so one day he told the person calling that I had just packed my stuff and moved out a month ago and he doesn't know where or hasn't heard from me. He told another caller that I had passed away. No more calls from those people after those times. Another thing you can try is to have a recording set that you can use for these kinds of calls that says something like, "this is the metropolitan police, the party you are calling can not come to the phone right now and it will probably be several months before they are released" and then hang up. Or as one person said to tell them that you are recording the calls from them now and that all calls from them will be recorded for your protection (this works on scammer calls too cause they usually hang up as soon as you say that and don't call back).

You have NO obligation for anyone's debt - regardless of your business relationship.  It is again the law to reveal to a third party that a person owes money to an entity.  I would threaten to report this behavior to the attorney general's office/consumer protection bureau of your State.

Correction: "It is against the law..."

I discovered a way to stop all f7future calls. After the usual oilerplate at the beginning ,they usually tell you the call is being recorded . Due to unrelated circumstances I also record all my calls for security reasons . B6 law I am required to inform the other person to the fact .as soon as she heard that the call was immediately dropped . Haven't heard back . The call came in before the lockdown ?

My DIL had a habit of posting her cell number on FB and some collector captured it and called her looking for me. Fortunately my son was with her when she got the call and took the phone from her. When they demanded he give her my contact information, he refused. They threatened him and he told them: "I have the resources to tie you up in court for a long time". They hung up and never called back. Needless to say, my son gave my DIL a talking to about posting her personal information on social media!

It is not legal - even if it was you in person and not your answering machine. They are trying to deceive you, which is also illegal.