Illegal collection agency - Wilbur and Associates, Bloomington, IL

Michelle never provided enough information for us to know whether she had insurance or not, and her daughter should not be getting calls at all.

Sounds like this collection agency is trying to avoid going to court, where they would have to provide all the details of the alleged debt, including how much the other party to the collision got from their own insurance company.

I settled a claim with them in Dec2020. ,now they are coming at me again on the same claim a year and few months after . I ignored their calls and now they filed it with Supreme Court !

Relax.  The Debt Validation Letter that they sent to you via US mail, (proving that the debt was truly owed), along with the receipt showing your payment and the follow-up documents (like a Settlement Agreement) they sent to you (via the US mail) showing that the debt was paid in full, will be enough to quash any further claims.  Just send them copies of these documents.  If they continue to harass you, you can sue them, using the FDCPA as a guide.

https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/rule ... ctices-act-text

There's a right way to settle legit debts.  I hope you followed the process properly.

CVanNY wrote:

now they filed it with Supreme Court

Wow, It is amazing that they were able to go straight to your State's Supreme Court and skip all of the lower, superior and appellate courts.

Actually you can't under the FDCPA since it only covers consumer debt.  Traffic accidents and insurance subrogation claims do not fall under consumer debt and the collection agency doesn't have to follow those laws.  See Resident47's post from May of 2016 on page 2.

NY Supreme Court is actually the lower court.  Not sure why they named it that way.  https://nycourts.gov/courts/index.shtml

Quote:

YORK CITY

Supreme Court

County Court

City Court

District Court

Family Court

Surrogate's Court

Town & Village Courts

APPELLATE COURTS

Lower Appellate Courts

Appellate Divisions

Court of Appeals

Ah, you left out "Tennis Court". Bada Bing, Bada Boom!

I wish the FDCPA could guide the defense in more than principle. Nothing has changed in the six years since I first examined the Act's lack of coverage.

The ink has just dried on yet another FDCPA/subro claim dismissal, this time in Pennsylvania. The plaintiff didn't like how her landlord's insurer tried to collect on their claim following a fire in Spring 2019. The tenant's lawyer insinuated she wasn't liable, and tried to anchor both FDCPA and its state law equivalent FCEUA to the rental contract.

Apparently a few cases had long ago pulled the same stunt of using contract coverage to preserve Fair Debt claims. As noted in the dismissal memorandum, that was before court opinions gelled to reject any treatment of subrogation as consumer debt collection. The PA judge echoed current thought:

"Defendants argue that the subrogation claim is not the result of a consumer purchase, but rather flows from the liability of Plaintiff arising out of her alleged negligence in causing the fire. Defendants further argue that this obligation is not the type of claim protected by consumer protection statutes ..."

After dissecting a few past cases failing to marry FDCPA to subro, the memo agrees that "a subrogation claim such as the one at issue in this case is not a transaction under the FDCPA which constitutes a debt".

The memo drives another coffin nail besides: "Plaintiff’s legal duty not to start a fire exists independently of any contractual obligations that she may have. Whether set intentionally or unintentionally, the damages that flow from the fire are tort damages, not contract damages. The mere fact that Plaintiff had a lease ... does not change the fact that fire damages are tort and not contract damages. Accordingly, the subrogation claim in this case is not a debt as defined by the FDCPA ..."

Felicia Chavanne vs. Erie Insurance & Second Look, Inc. - via Justia, dismissal memorandum, 28 Mar 2022