topic Collection Agency called me -- looking for family member? in Rebuilding Your Credit

Collection Agency called me -- looking for family member?

xerostatus — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 19:46:00 GMT

So, today I received a phone call from a collection agency, and they were looking for a family member.

I told em, "that's not me.." They asked, "are you familiar with them?"

I didn't want to lie, but at the same time I didn't want to give away any further information, so i said, "uhh no im not sure."

They said, "sorry for the call.." and we hung up.

How'd they obtain my phone number?? >_<

Are they allowed to do this?

Did I handle this correctly?

If not, what would be an ideal way to deal with something like this?

Re: Collection Agency called me -- looking for family member?

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 19:56:20 GMT

Yes, they can call looking for location only. And they can only call once unless they have reason to believe you may have further information.

§ 804. Acquisition of location information [15 USC 1692b]

Any debt collector communicating with any person other than the consumer for the purpose of acquiring location information about the consumer shall --

(1) identify himself, state that he is confirming or correcting location information concerning the consumer, and, only if expressly requested, identify his employer;

(2) not state that such consumer owes any debt;

(3) not communicate with any such person more than once unless requested to do so by such person or unless the debt collector reasonably believes that the earlier response of such person is erroneous or incomplete and that such person now has correct or complete location information;

Re: Collection Agency called me -- looking for family member?

xerostatus — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 20:39:09 GMT

So, what actually happened was:

They called and seeing that i got a missed call from an 800 number, I ended up calling THEM back (not knowing, initially, who the number belonged to...)

Then a nice, heartwarming message instantly played that said, something along the lines of, "You've reached Portfolio services, etc etc. This call is regarding a debt which we are attempting to collect, any information we obtain etc etc will be used something-something.."

Then the human came on, and that's when it was revealed that the person they were trying to reach (by name) is a family member;

Now isn't this technically against point (1)?

Re: Collection Agency called me -- looking for family member?

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 20:50:56 GMT

I guess it could be. Did they leave a voicemail?