collection account not mine

[Anonymous]

I got an alert today showing a new collection account. The problem here is that this account is not mine. It's for a payday loan which I have never done.

I called the collector just to get some information and they were quite aggressive and threatened to have me arrested. I asked for them to send me proof of this debt and was told that they don't mail anything out.

How do I get this off of my report ? I was on track to get a mortgage next month and I feel this is going to ruin that opportunity that I've been working really hard toward.

[Anonymous]

Threatening you with arrest is a blatant FDCPA violation. Call them again, record your call, and let them threaten you again. Then ask for their physical address where your attorney can send the summons for the FDCPA violation you plan on suing them for. Take the recoording to any consumer attorney - easy $1K split between you and the attorney - and don't forget to demand removal of the item from your reports.

[gibeon]

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@Anonymous wrote:
I got an alert today showing a new collection account. The problem here is that this account is not mine. It's for a payday loan which I have never done.

I called the collector just to get some information and they were quite aggressive and threatened to have me arrested. I asked for them to send me proof of this debt and was told that they don't mail anything out.

How do I get this off of my report ? I was on track to get a mortgage next month and I feel this is going to ruin that opportunity that I've been working really hard toward.

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I would recommend immediately disputing it with the CRA as well. 

[Anonymous]

Do I have to inform them I am recording for it to be legal?

[tufa4311]

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@Anonymous wrote:
Do I have to inform them I am recording for it to be legal?

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Depends - you need to know if your situtation is governed by Federal law or State law. Federal law allows recording of a conversation as long as one party is aware of the recording (and, yes, that one party can be you) - this is known as the one-party consent law. However, if your situation is governed by state law then it gets gray, some states allow one-party consent while others do not. To add one more bend in it, if it is State law that governs your situtation but both parties of the concersation do not live in the same state well, then you need to determine who takes precedence, your state or theirs (if one of the state's allow it and the other doesn't)

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
Do I have to inform them I am recording for it to be legal?

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I would be contacting a consumer law attorney asap and ask them what they have to say. Likely there is enough right now to file a lawsuit. Many consumer law attorneys won't even cost you anything, they get their fees in addition to your money from the debt collector. You can get up to $1000 for a violation, the consumer attorney will get money separate from that. Being that this isn't even your debt and they are threatening you and damaging your credit (which by the way can be an actual damage), you should have enough to go on right there.

[RobertEG]

In addition to pursuing their FDCPA violation for threatenng your arrest, if you dispute the debt, you should send them a DV request, thus imposing a cease collection bar.

Additionally, if you are willing to assert that you never had a debt with the asserted credtior, then you can file a police report assertng identity theft, send a copy to the CRA, and get the collection immediately blocked from your credit report under FCRA 605B.

If CR deletion is critical due to an impending application for new credit, then getting an identity theft block would most likely be the quickest and easiest step, as it is independent of any actions by the debt collector.

[Anonymous]

If their phone system contains a "this call may be recorded for quality  or training purposes" then you DO NOT have to inform them you are recording the call as well, no matter what state you (or they) are in. Even in two party states, such notifications amount to implied consent. One party cannot record a call, while denying the other party the right to record.

There are only about a dozen "two party consent" states.

[Anonymous]

Thank you everyone!  I was really unsure on how to proceed.  I will post an update when something happens!

Once again,  Thank you!