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FCO/Apartment Debt

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Anonymous
Not applicable

FCO/Apartment Debt

So I have a collection account through FCO for an old apartment debt that was joint and I thought had been taken care of. Guess not.

 

Anyway, it is only for $736 and I am prepared to pay in full, no worries. However, I have read FCO is a pain to deal with and getting a PFD is unheard of. I had emailed the CEO of the OC to see if they could recall the debt/collection agreement and I could pay them directly. I received a follow up from him saying his management would be in touch with me, and a subsequent email from management saying unfortunately it was sent to FCO and there's nothing they could do.

 

I wrote to FCO and asked for two things: 1) validation of the debt and 2) PFD. They responded with an extremely dark, nearly illegible copy of the lease agreement, and a statement of charges (but no explanations of arbitrary numbers such as lease breaking fee). They did NOT respond to my PFD request. I reminded them that I was looking for a legible, more complete debt validation, to include my signature and SSN (nothing they provided had my SSN on it), as well as an explanation of charges, and reminded them they did not hear from them regarding my PFD offer.

 

They basically said they will investigate with the OC and I will hear from them. In messing around, it appears it allowed me to create a login with my old account number and go onto the site to pay a bill. While it shows $0 owed (meaning FCO must own the debt, rather than simply be collecting?), it would let me pay $736. I know it's a power move and risky, but couldn't I pay the $736 to OC and then send another DV to FCO? Something like that?

 

Any suggestions on how to best address?

Message 1 of 3
2 REPLIES 2
Anonymous
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Re: FCO/Apartment Debt

Bump
Message 2 of 3
RobertEG
Legendary Contributor

Re: FCO/Apartment Debt

You should not mix a DV request with negotiations on payment of the debt.

 

A DV request, if timely, imposes a cease collection bar on a debt collector, which remains in effect until such time as they have provided adequate debt validation.

A timely DV must be sent either prior to having received a dunning notice, or within 30 days after dunning notice.

If your DV was untimely, it imposes no cease collection bar, and they can ignore it and go on about their business as usual.

If your DV was timely, it precludes them from any response to any negotiations on the debt, including a PFD offer.

 

As for adequacy of their offered validation, the FDCPA does not explicitly require that they send any documentation or prove the legitimacy the debt, only that they investigate and reach a determination supported by that investigation.  While some federal appellant jurisdicitons have interpreted FDCPA 809(b) as requiring some documentation, it is not the usual interpretation. If you consider their validation to be insufficient, the result is that you consider them to still be under a cease collection bar until they have provided what you consider to be adequate validation.  At this point, there is no violation on their part.

I presume you did not retain a copy of the lease that you signed?

 

As for paying hte OC, they apparently no longer own the debt, so cannot accept any payment. 

Even if they still own the debt and accepted payment, that would not require the debt collector to delete their collection.

I would not advise sending payment to the OC until you first determine that they still own the debt AND are willing to accept payment.\

They have the legal right to insist that any payments now be made via their assigned agent if they still own the debt........

Message 3 of 3
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