I have a Spanish last name and my middle name is Peter. I was hounded for months looking for someone named Pedro [My Last Name].
Eventually I told the guy calling, “I know who I am. You’re just doing your job, but something’s wrong here. Let’s try to figure it out.”
He said, “I DON’T HAVE TO LISTEN TO THAT KIND OF LANGUAGE SIR!” and hung up. I never heard from them again.
Did you send certified mail with return receipt? Maybe that’s why they answered so quickly for me.
A long time back, a hospital from a state across the country was calling for collections on a guy who was clearly gaming the system for drugs, and continuously gave out a number that wasn’t his. I looked up the place online and called the administrator, explained the entire thing and that if I received any further calls I would attempt to hit the lottery in a suit. They never called again
I’m probably one of the first people on this list. I had a credit card. I managed payments poorly but eventually payed it off. I made sacrifices to pay it off.
Let me say that part again. I paid it off.
The next month they were calling again for more money. They kept collecting. They wanted to collect the whole amount of a very large final payment I had made. It was brutal and awful. They were calling every day. I disputed the debt in writing. I showed them proof of payment. They didn’t stop. I tried to escalate it to a level where it could be fixed - I don’t think I ever talked to anyone with the power to fix it. They couldn’t take my proof over the number in their system.
They sold the debt to a collection agency while it was under dispute.
I filled out a complaint the with Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and suddenly I had executive level people from the company calling to make nice. That’s exactly what they are trained to do. They have broken multiple laws, had poorly trained lower level employees harassing you, built a system to systematically fleece you and now you are pissed at them and have a case. They are here to calm you down but they are not the best at follow through.
When you file a complaint the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have an amount of restitution you would like. Consider the time and emotional energy they have stolen from you. Put that amount in the complaint, The top of what they will settle for is $1,000 - the same amount as a violation of collection laws. I didn’t know that and asked for too little.
I'm not 100% sure, but I think that title transfer does not change who the plates are registered to. The buyer should have obtained their own plates.
Depends on the state. For instance California plates stay with the car when sold to someone else within the state, while in Kansas you take the plates and return them with the notice of change in title ownership.
Yes we’ve been getting collection calls on hospital bills that we had either a) paid, or b) insurance was supposed to pay but they didn’t submit. I sorted out the insurance one eventually (I hope). Back in August, I took my daughter for a sports physical. The doctor’s office charges $40 for those, which I paid. Now they’re after me for some $4.36 charge for that physical that they never told me about and didn’t charge me for at the time of service.
I don’t get calls for it anymore, but occasionally I still get letters demanding money for a car that I won a Lemon Law settlement on 20 years ago. Not only was I not liable for this under that law, but they somehow resold the vehicle(?!). The car was a literal deathtrap: doors that didn’t work and an electrical system prone to randomly shorting out (with sparks!).
The first two letters are probably the most useful here. The second in particular I’ve found really helpful (with editing for the specific circumstances) in getting bogus debt collectors to drop it, since they rarely have the info requested. I send it registered mail, return receipt requested, just to drive home to them that I know they received the letter and they won’t be able to weasel out with “He’s never asked us for that information before.”. I try to get everything in writing so I have a copy of what they’ve said/claimed. In the letter I reference the date and time of any phone calls and the name the caller gave me. I get and reference their account number, so they can’t claim there’s any ambiguity over which bill it is.
I got collections calls for a while from a messed up medical bill. Talked to the provider after the first call and they found their mistake, but the collectors kept calling for a couple months. I explained the first time, and told them to contact the provider. Hilariously they said they could not do that, which is obviously false. They threatened to sue, I said “go ahead, I’ll win”. Over the next few weeks I responded with increasing brevity “there is no bill” y-hang up-. Eventually they stopped.
It wasn’t really that bad called maybe twice a week. The lies were annoying, but it wasn’t that stressful as I could call their bluff with absolute confidence.
Anyhow not even having read the comments here let me make an observation, most of the stories are about medical bills from people in america. Heh.
If you’re a big corporation you get away with anything. If not, its best to know the law and be very careful how you tread. Because even if you do know the law, if you go up against a powerful interest, you’re cooked anyway. The USA has become the worlds fanciest and richest banana republic. Its as simple as that.
I was actually moved to cut my landline by repeat calls from debt collectors for debts that I had nothing to do with. One was incurred by my ex-wife’s daughter, and knowing her (the daughter, not the ex), I have little doubt that she listed me as a reference without my knowledge or permission, but the company took me off their call list when I finally called them back. The rest were either for people with my last name that I’d never heard of, or that I had no connection with at all, and of course, the robocalls tell you that if you’re not the person they’re looking for, you should just ignore it, but then they keep calling and calling and calling and never mind if you’re trying to take a nap.
I don’t know if you should go for the third option. As difficult and bureacratic as government can be to deal with, I’ve heard much worse horror stories of debt collecting agencies, including acts of pure bullying. I’d keep pushing the city courts to do something about it until something gets done about this situation.
Can’t really “like”, but I do agree.
The typical individual has to spend an inordinate amount of time and effort to just get to level ground when faced with BS like this.
find out the address of the place calling, contact Homeland Security and report some suspicious activity was seen there and next thing you know, drone strike!
Hey I can dream…
I’ve had a few collections agencies call me with debts that I supposedly owed. I always calmly ask them the name of their company, tell them I’ve never heard of them (I’ve never heard of any of them), then I ask who the debt was originally owed to - was this a credit card bill, medical bills, etc. The caller never knows the original debtor, so then I tell them I’d be happy to discuss the debt and make arrangements when they send me a copy of the original debt that they purchased, with the original company’s name on it. I simply explain that I do not have any outstanding debt that I know of and I will not send them any money if they can’t tell me who I was originally indebted to.
I have never had any agency send me proof of debt. They never have the information available and I’m pretty sure they just give up because they buy debts for pennies on the dollar and it’s not worth it to them to continue the ruse.
Don’t forget that these claims, fraudulent or not, will be reported to credit agencies and they have no obligation to contact you and may sit there for years before you find out. Companies can put things on your credit report and then it’s guilty until proven innocent.
Google Voice just sends those calls straight to the spam folder.
I got loads for calls for the previous owners of my number. Some collection agencies believed I wasnt who they were looking for, some didn’t. The debts just just sold on and on and on.
Medical bills do seem to be a particularly common source of false debt collection. In my case, it was for a years-old bill for an MRI that had been paid, normally, on time. The shady sent collectors insisted I must be mistaken; in response, since they wouldn’t respond reasonably to letters and would hang up on me whenever I noted that I was also recording the call, I contacted all three credit reporting bureaus about the record on my credit report, along with documentation. They promptly removed the records.
The next time the debt connectors called, insisting that the bureaus had made a mistake, I just told them that they should feel free to discuss the mistake with the bureaus, and that they should contact my lawyers in the future. I have never heard from them since, and my credit is fine.
So long as the bureaus agree with you, which can certainly happen, as they do have a review process, and the collection agency won’t sue, it really doesn’t matter what they say you owe. Having lawyers to refer to seems to help immensely in getting rid of them, though; they never seem willing to actually call them.
Not an option if you’re a psych outpatient and the doc’s office fairly regularly calls you on a withheld number.
No question there. Too bad the office won’t unblock a line so patients don’t need to feel anxious about who is calling.
