Familial identity theft and collections

[Anonymous]

My fiancé has just received a lovely New Years present in the mail, a collection letter for an unpaid power bill to the tune of ~500$.

Now this is a surprise to both of us. Our utilities have been in my name since we moved here three years ago. Before that we rented my parent's unused floor of the house (dad gave up renting it out after an ugly eviction when I was little) for a flat rate and they paid the utilities. And he lived with his mother and step father before that...

Right after he turned 18, one of his family members opened a credit card in his name, maxed it at a liqueur store, and intercepted all mail about it. The cc company eventually got his phone number somehow once it was past due, and that's how we found out about it. His family played him, he couldn't bring himself to file a police report, so the cc company wouldn't treat it like identity theft.

Luckily they charged the debt off instead of selling it to collections, and that ugly, first piece of his credit report finally aged off this past October.

Even with that ugly charge off lingering, I eventually managed to get him eligible for his own CC's by having him as an authorized user on my cards (paid down low before the statement generates for good utilization, then paid off in full to avoid interest) for over a year to boost his score. And he's following my example with card use, credit score on the rise.

He was finally feeling financially secure enough to propose last month, then we had to ring in 2015 with the identity theft rearing its ugly head again. We're guessing it's his parents.

The collection letter doesn't detail the address the power bill was accrued at, or the dates. And it's from an out of state collection agency that looks fishy "creditreportingalert.com"

Right now our plan is to contact the power company directly to verify the debt, and our suspicions. Best case scenario someone there can actually help us and get the debt transferred to his parents without much hassle. Worst case we take the hit and pay off the collection agency without it hitting his credit report. We are planning for a house and a credit hit to him does so much more damage than a 500$ hit to our savings.

Now with all that backstory out of the way, does anyone have experience similar to ours? Is it even possible for the power company to help us at this point since the debt has been sold off already? And for preventative measures, it seems like the best option would be to buy credit report freezes at each of the credit bureaus. Does anyone have experience with them in Connecticut?

Any other suggestions are welcome too. Happy New Year!

[Anonymous]

I have had bad experiences with the electric company in my home state (midwest). Roommate and I both had electric in our names- young college, lease in both names, needed the good credit. I worked nights and weekends and rarely had time to do much of anything- so I would just give him the $$ for the bill and have him pay.

Needless to say, when they came to turn off our power, I cried. Nothing I coud do to stop, nothing I could do to rehabiliate it. They basically said, to bad, so sad. They would not reconnect until I paid the balance in full.

So, while mine is nothing like yous- the electric companies are known to be notoriously awful.

Please freeze your reports and file a police report. Thats not family who steal/foot you with the bill.  Thats not someone worth protecting if they will hurt you- if it was bad circumstances that is one thing. This is lying about it, stealing, and federal offense. 

[RobertEG]

All you need to do is file a police report stating that you did not authroize the account, and unless you have specific info, you can truthfully answer that you have no information as to who did so.  The creditor or is not part of the ID theft process, as your sworn statement in a police report is adequate to get any reporting related to the identity theft blocked from inclusion in your credit report.

Since your police report cannot contain any knowingly false statements, just be sure you dont make any such statements.

You dont have to assume who or how the theft occured, so could avoid accusing anyone unless you have facts.

You must, however, be willing to accept that if the police do investigate, the cards may fall upon family members.

[Anonymous]

That "bad circumstances" thing you said is the kicker. His little (half)sister had kids too young then split up with their father right before Christmas a year ago. And the few times we've seen his parents recently they mentioned having to help her out and downsizing Christmas this year.

So it's likely they opened the account when they moved in there like 5 years ago,because their credit was already shot, and just went delinquent on it recently. We won't know until we go down and talk to someone in person.