FTC Hangs Up On “Rachel From Cardholder Services”

Be that as it may, I got 2 calles from Rachel this afternoon (11/2/2102). So much for government "action"!!

This likely refers to the Temporary Restraining Orders placed on the defendants. It's become common in these scambusting cases for the FTC to secure the TRO right away so that the targets can't squirm away before the meat and potatoes of the lawsuits are served. I'd agree their choice of words for the layman in the press release could be dismaying.

Correct ... the scam is too cheap to run for MANY players not to be at the gambling table. Let's please have a halt to whiny "but they're still calling" complaints here until it's known which "they" has placed the illegal call. It remains our duty to report credit reprice scam calls to the FTC and attorneys general until ALL of the criminals are rounded up and hogtied.

Reporting will help but the problem is these frauds are like roaches. You kill a bunch of them, another bunch crawls out of somewhere. The fact that the scam has gone continental shows how they operate. They operate from 4 different continents all managed by different frauds that outsourced the numbers and equipments.

It's particularly dismaying in light of the fact that, for all practical purposes, the Press Release is the crowning achievement of this "action".

And the people "whining" about still getting the calls have correctly percieved that this is more inaction than action, form over function, essentially a tax-funded sham. But the Press Release is very real!

We have abondoned all expectations of accountability on the part of our "public servants" if we applaud this effort. This should have been a matter of criminal prosecution, and the FTC isn't even chartered to do that.

} the people ... correctly percieved that this is more inaction than action

Hmm, not all the complaints are informed. Every time one of these cases is filed and publicized it sparks a wave of grousing from people who think one lawsuit will stop their phones from ringing forever. You'll soon read a dozen times, "I thought they caught the scammers, why are they still calling me?" In a few weeks we'll be right back to "da gubmint does nothing" remarks, and all the while the same apathetic complainers have done nothing to help themselves or their neighbors.

I'm a cynic myself about the FTC's performance as defender and deterrent, enough that you see me constantly promoting private action against phone-powered frauds and scofflaws. These "debt fixer" scammers have however made it exceptionally hard for individuals to find relief in a TCPA suit. We need organized, systemic help. So I don't piss on the Commissioners' backs when they are showing an effort to throw open the curtains on Telemarketing Sales Rule violators. I simply ask them to do more, and to give citizens better legal tools, realizing there are limits of funding, manpower, and a prevailing attitude that people with debt problems supposedly can only blame their own poor choices.

I'll bet there will be no abatement in these types of calls whatsoever as a result of this FTC "action". Too bad we can't do a statistical analysis of the complaints filed on this site, it's as good a proxy as any as to what kind of scams are "in the wild" (using the telephone vector) and how prevalent they are.

And I am not the least bit cynical about the FTC's *performance*. Its performance is by design, carefully calibarated by funding and and upper management to be ineffective but appear otherwise. This is just the most recent effort in an ongoing PR campaign to make it look as if they are sincerely trying to do something about the problem. I am cynical about their intentions, but their performance is pretty impressive, once you understand the real objective is to do nothing and present the opposite appearance.

This site has probably damaged the scammers more than all of the FTC "actions" combined over the FTC's much longer existence, and at a small fraction of the cost!

I'm going to start pressing "1", leave the phone on the table, hang up later.

lets just cut their nuts off with a dull knife

If they had any to begin with they'd have REAL jobs instead of being tele-stalkers!  You'll have to come up with something else!

We'll have to use our own freedoms to block numbers, buy blockers, invent new call blockers, and find other alternatives. Since people pay for their phone service, the responsibility of creating unlimited call blockers rests upon the providers. If they are ineffective on the long run, we'll have to take control of our own phones. Switch to a provider that has unlimited call blocking capacity, filtering calls, etc. If we collectively ignored. I mean everyone who gets these calls ignored, blocked and never gave the caller a dime, the criminals will eventually run out of their scam business and profit. They should be brought to justice as well and treated like criminals cause they are infact criminals in disguise.

Unfortunately. We have little cause to celebrate. These scumbag scammers will, no doubt, develope a new scam to perpetrate upon the innocent, unsuspecting and honest people in America. I'm sure we'll be hearing from them soon.

Card services uses different numbers each time- (818-900-0900) (631-773-1002) (415-825-6637). Rachel from card services will not go away.!.Being on the do not call list does not help with all these telemarketers..! Thanks to caller "I.D". I can let it ring and they have left a message twice on my machine they getting brave these days!

i think the consumer should be allowed to block any calls/area codes and ANY person involved in this scam should be arrested at a federal level and put into a federal prison for no less than five years per offense.  The caller id system needs to be revamped to eliminate the spoofers.

Illegal robocalling is a punishmentless crime.    The government simply isn't serious about stopping them.   The FTC can invoke their laughable, petty-cash fines (only to be reduced further once the criminals plead "poverty" to the appeals court,) but it clearly does no good.   Things only get worse, the criminals more brazen, because there is simply no such thing as punishment.