Collection Agency response

[vonfore]

I checked my credit reports and followed the advice on this website for debt valadation. I sent out letters to six collection agencies stating that I need the debts to be valadated on Dec 6th...Im sending out second notices this week to let those companies know they are in volation of the FDCPA.....here is a rather strange letter I received from Gulf State Credit....

Your letter, addressed to OSI Portfolio Service, has been fowarded to Gulf State Credit. Please be advised, Palasades Collections is the actual owner of the account you are disputing. Palisades Collections then placed the account with Gulf State Credit for collection.

Palisades purchased (yes purchased...mistake #1) the account directly from AT&T. Our records further indicated the above referenced account was opened on April 9, 1999 and charged off on November 5, 1999(mistake #2) with a balance of $44.27. The account was opened under the name of (my name) the social security number used to open this account was (my ssn).

In your December 6th correspondence, you claim that you were not notified of this collection account and you believe Palisades Collections has violated a section of the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act. This act requires an agency to send an initial notice of the debt to the consumers last known address as provided by the creditor. Consumer rights and responsibilites regarding a dispute or request for verification are provided in this initial notice. The Act requires an agency to provide verification of a debt upon receipt of a consumers written request received by the agency within thirty days after the consumer receives initial notice. Our records indicate an initial letter was sent to you on June 6, 2002 (mistake #3) at the address of (an apartment where I lived at in 1999). Gulf State Credit has no record of receiving any correspondence from you prior to your letter of December 6, 2002, some six months after the initial letter was sent and well past the 30-day validation letter.(mistake #4)

You are also erred in your understanding of credit reporting of a disputed account and validation requirements of a disputed account. The account will continue to be reported to the credit bureaus, however, the account will be reported as disputed until such a time that the documents are received to validate the debt. Secondly, the articles(I asked for a signed contract in my original letter) you have asked to be provided to validate this account are not required by Law and will not be provided. When Congress enacted the FDPCA, they did not intend to either prevent or seriously burden legitimate efforts of third parties to collect debts, but rather intended to prevent abuse. In addition, the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has stated in Chaudhry v. Gallerizzo, 174 F 3d 394(tth Cir. 1999) " Verification of a debt involves nothing more than the debt collectior confirming in writing that the amount being demanded is what the creditor is claming is owed; the debt collector is not required to keep detailed files of the alleged debt. Consistent with legislative history, verification is only intended to eliminate the...problem of debt collectors dunning the wrong person or attemptin to collect debts which the consumer has already paid. There is no obligation to forward copies of bills or other detailed evidence of the debt".

The account has been coded as disputed in our files. Documents have been requested from the original creditor to substantiate tis bdebt. Once received, a copy will be forwarded to you. If you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me directly at 678-417-8226

Vanessa Thompson

Compliance Paralegal

here are the issues Im going to take up with them:

1) they still have not provided a contract with my signature that proves I have a valid contractual and lawful obligation to Gulf State, Palisades or OSI Portfolio Service.

2) according to their letter, Palidaded PURCHASED the account directly from AT&T...but the FDCPA states: TITLE VIII - DEBT COLLECTION PRACTICES [Fair Debt Collection Practices Act]

§ 803. Definitions [15 USC 1692a]

As used in this title --

(4) The term "creditor" means any person who offers or extends credit creating a debt or to whom a debt is owed, but such term does not include any person to the extent that he receives an assignment or transfer of a debt in default solely for the purpose of facilitating collection of such debt for another.

3) they claim they purchased the debt on April 9, 1999, charged it off on November 5, 1999,but their records indicate they sent me an inital letter on June 6, 2002, over two years later!!!!!! what a crook of zhit! If that is the case, they re-dated the dates of last activity on my credit reports...

4) that crap about getting my letter wll after the 30 day validation is a crop of crap because the FDCPA section 809c states that the failure of a consumer to dispute the validity of a debt under this section may not be construed by any court as an admission of liability by the consumer.

Im going to send them a second letter because they havent validated the original request. They will use that court opinion to say that they dont have to provide me written proof of anything...is there any way around that with another opinion?

[LadynRed]

Yes. Send them a copy of the FTC Wollman opinion letter, and a copy of Spears V. Brennan case. Between the two, it says that neither a printout of charges alone NOR a contract ALONE is sufficient validation.. BOTH must be provided.

[bw4444]

Here is the full quote from Chaudhry v. Gallerizzo:

Contrary to Appellants' contention, verification of a debt involves

nothing more than the debt collector confirming in writing that the

amount being demanded is what the creditor is claiming is owed; the

debt collector is not required to keep detailed files of the alleged debt.

See Azar v. Hayter, 874 F.Supp. 1314, 1317 (N.D. Fla.), aff'd, 66

F.3d 342 (11th Cir. 1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1048 (1996). Con-sistent

with the legislative history, verification is only intended to

"eliminate the ... problem of debt collectors dunning the wrong person

or attempting to collect debts which the consumer has already paid."

S. Rep. No. 95-382, at 4 (1977), reprinted in 1977 U.S.C.C.A.N.

1695, 1699. There is no concomitant obligation to forward copies of

bills or other detailed evidence of the debt.

This seems to contradict Spears v. Brennan. Any comments?

[cookiemnster]

<blockquote>Originally posted by bw4444

Here is the full quote from Chaudhry v. Gallerizzo:

Contrary to Appellants' contention, verification of a debt involves

nothing more than the debt collector confirming in writing that the

amount being demanded is what the creditor is claiming is owed; the

debt collector is not required to keep detailed files of the alleged debt.

See Azar v. Hayter, 874 F.Supp. 1314, 1317 (N.D. Fla.), aff'd, 66

F.3d 342 (11th Cir. 1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1048 (1996). Con-sistent

with the legislative history, verification is only intended to

"eliminate the ... problem of debt collectors dunning the wrong person

or attempting to collect debts which the consumer has already paid."

S. Rep. No. 95-382, at 4 (1977), reprinted in 1977 U.S.C.C.A.N.

1695, 1699. There is no concomitant obligation to forward copies of

bills or other detailed evidence of the debt.

This seems to contradict Spears v. Brennan. Any comments?

</blockquote>

Spears v Brennan is newer, so it actually contradicts this one (and from my understanding is more commonly accepted). This case deals with the amounts claimed to be owed, rather than the issue of "is this debt really mine?"

Spears deals more with a CA violating the FDCPA in order to collect a debt.

Also, to the original poster - OSI and Gulfstate are the same company. I'm pretty sure that Palisades is part of that same umbrella.

They also should have placed the DLA as the 1999 date, and used the 'date opened' for the 2002 date. Especially since Equifax uses DLA as the date from which items are removed from the report - however wrong that may be.

[vonfore]

thanks for your opinion gang... being that the bill was only for $44.00, do you guys think I should send them a settlement letter for like $20 and request them to change the listing to paid as agreed on the activity line since they cite a court opinion that they wont provide me with a signed contract....additionally, if they dont agree to accept the settlement, I will write the same letter to all three CRA's and use Gulf States own letter as ammo against them to get the date of last activity changed from what is currently on my credit report (2001) to 1999( which is on their letter)

[cookiemnster]

<blockquote>Originally posted by vonfore

thanks for your opinion gang... being that the bill was only for $44.00, do you guys think I should send them a settlement letter for like $20 and request them to change the listing to paid as agreed on the activity line since they cite a court opinion that they wont provide me with a signed contract....additionally, if they dont agree to accept the settlement, I will write the same letter to all three CRA's and use Gulf States own letter as ammo against them to get the date of last activity changed from what is currently on my credit report (2001) to 1999( which is on their letter)

</blockquote>

Noooooooooooo. You want to pay them for DELETION. A paid collection is no better than an unpaid collection, as far as your score and any potential creditors go. For that small of an amount, if it were me, I'd just offer them the whole amount in exchange for deletion.

[creditfix]

Do not pay it without a DELETION letter.