UPDATED w/RESULTS!! Please review my letter before I send it to AFNI and tell me if I am being to nice.

[nosxih]

This is for an item on all three of DW reports.
They are reporting every month regardless of DV after DV being sent. Now they are reporting this as 120 days late two month in a row.

This is a fraudulent Verizon account that was opened by someone else not DW or me. Police and fraud reports have been filed.

I will not tolerate this and so I took the second DV letter found in the forum and added a little bit of my anger.

Shall I send as is or change it?

Dear Sir/Madam:
There is no doubt that you know that according to the United States Federal Government you are NOT allowed to make any attempts to collect a debt or pursue any collection activity during the time before a debt is validated. You are blatantly ignoring this Federal law by pursuing collection of a fraudulent debt after I have sent you two requests to submit to me evidence of the validity of this debt. In case you have forgotten, which I know that you have not, I would like to remind you of the case concerning Twyla Boatley vs. Diem Corporation. This was case number CIV 03-0762 held in the United States District Court back in 2004 in the district of Arizona.
In this case it was ruled that reporting a collection account to any credit reporting agency is considered collection activity. This set the precedent for your illegal activities.

Getting back to the requests for validation that I sent you, I sent the first request in March of 2008 via certified mail with a return receipt. A representative from AFNI signed for it on 03-10-2008. That person was Troy Patterson. In case you do not recall receiving the letter, here is the tracking number: 7007 1490 0002 8868 9421 please write that down as you will need it in the future. Your response to that validation request was answered by placing a 120 day late update my Equifax report and updating my Trans Union and Experian reports. You did not send the requested information and you did not validate the debt. This violation will be submitted to the Attorney General, the Better Business Bureau and certain other legal offices.

I sent the second request in the same manner as the first, via USPS certified mail with a return receipt request. Again, you sent Troy Patterson to pick it up and it was signed for it on 4-28-2008
Again for your records, the tracking number for that request is: 7008 0150 0000 1951 6115. And again, you responded by placing a 120 day late update on my Equifax report and updated my Trans Union and Experian reports. This second violation will be submitted to the Attorney General of my state and yours, the Better Business Bureau and another legal office.

You are already in violation of US Federal laws outlined in FDCPA. While it will only be a minor inconvenience for you if I choose to follow through with litigation, know this: It will only be a minor inconvenience for me as well and if you do not or cannot validate this alleged debt or cease collection including removal from any and all credit reporting agencies within the time frame set forth in the FDCPA (which have already expired) I will take this matter to the courts and it will be resolved there.

I request that all contact with me be in writing, and only when you can provide adequate validation of this alleged debt. To refresh your memory on what constitutes legal validation, I am giving a list of the required documentation:
• Complete payment history, the requirement of which has been established via Spears v Brennan 745 N.E.2d 862; 2001 Ind. App. LEXIS 509 and
• Agreement that bears the signature of the alleged debtor wherein they agreed to pay the original creditor.
• Letter of sale or assignment from the original creditor to your company. (Agreement with your client that grants you the authority to collect on this alleged debt.) Coppola v. Arrow Financial Services, 302CV577, 2002 WL 32173704(D.Conn., Oct. 29, 2002) - Information relating to the purchase of a bad debt is not proprietary or burdensome. Debtor must phrase their request clearly to obtain: The source of a debt and the amount a bad debt buyer paid for plaintiff's debt, how amount sought was calculated, where in issue a list of reports to credit bureaus, and documents conferring authority on defendant to collect debt.
• Intimate knowledge of the creation of the debt by you, the collection agency.
As you are already in violation, I expect all reference to this account be deleted from my credit report, as this entry and any update of such entry will be considered another violation. You have 5 days from the receipt of this letter to remove this account from any and all reporting agencies, or a complaint to the AG, BBB and FTC will be immediately filed for each and every violation from 03/10/2008 until this issue is resolved.

AFNI is well known for their belief that they are above the law and are not required to abide by any of the laws. This reputation will not serve you well when we meet in a courtroom to resolve this issue.

I expect a resolution to this matter within 5 days from the date that Troy Patterson signs for this certified letter which is being sent with the tracking code of: 7008 0150 0000 1951 6146

Thank You,

Message Edited by nosxih on 06-06-2008 02:28 PM

[BungalowMo]

Personally...I'm liking it!!!  As long as all of your case references are correct, that's a nice touch as well.

The letter takes on the presence of intelligence, and lets them know you have done your homework and fully intend to pursue this to the end.  At the very end, I wouldn't use Troy's name...or maybe add "or other authorized signee".  They could use that as...well, Troy didn't sign for it...bla bla.

Otherwise, sounds good.  You don't have to come across as mad, it's better to come across as informed!

Message Edited by BungalowMo on 06-04-2008 08:28 AM

[Schoolbuskid]

Nice letter i may tweak that first harvard collections!

[Anonymous]

Send a copy of the police report to the CRAs     dispute as account fraud!  The CRAs should delete the account & they should also notify the CA!!!

[nosxih]

All three CRA's have validated this everytime I sent them a delete letter. The only thing they did was to put a fraud altert on her CRs. I have not sent the police report to the CRAs. I just disputed it as fraudulent. This is 110% not DWs account. She has never had verizion anything, the SSNs are different, the shipping address that Verizion gave is no where near where we have ever lived and we have never received or paid  a bill on this account.

There was never a dunning letter sent either. It just came up on all three reports.

[Anonymous]

I think it's too long.  They will not read it.  Keep it business-like.

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Try emailing them, it was the only way I got a response.

 johnodonnell@afni.com , lisaanderson@afni.com, RecoveryTeam@afni.com JASONVANHEMERT@afni.com

Jason is the guy that finally responded to my DV's. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

instead of "please write that down"....I would put, "please retain this number"....they don't need to write it if they save the letter.

In one line you wrote, "Troy Patterson to pick it up and it was signed for it on 4-28-2008"...too many "it"s there- it should read "and it was signed for on..."

Otherwise, outstanding I think.  Go get 'em!!!

[nosxih]

Great thoughts and I have tried to implement each one into this updated letter which I have printed and am ready to send out CMRRR tomorrow AND send emails as suggested. Great Idea!

I have also shortened it to exactly one page and have fixed grammatical errors.
Thank you all for help.
Stick around for the results! See you in 10 days or so!


Dear Sir/Madam:
There is no doubt that you know that according to the United States Federal Government you are NOT allowed to make any attempts to collect a debt or pursue any collection activity during the time before a debt is validated. You are blatantly ignoring this Federal law by pursuing collection of a fraudulent debt after I have sent you two requests to submit to me evidence of the validity of this debt. In case you have forgotten, which I know that you have not, I would like to remind you of the case concerning Twyla Boatley vs. Diem Corporation. This was case number CIV 03-0762 held in the United States District Court back in 2004 in the district of Arizona. In this case it was ruled that reporting a collection account to any credit reporting agency is considered collection activity. This set the precedent for your illegal activities.

Getting back to the requests for validation that I sent you, I sent the first request in March of 2008 via certified mail with a return receipt. A representative from AFNI signed for it on 03-10-2008. That person was Troy Patterson. In case you do not recall receiving the letter, here is the tracking number: 7007 1490 0002 8868 9421 please retain this number as you will need it in the future. Your response to that validation request was answered by placing a 120 day late update my Equifax report and updating my Trans Union and Experian reports. You did not send the requested information and you did not validate the debt. This violation will be submitted to the Attorney General, the Better Business Bureau and certain other legal offices.

I sent the second request in the same manner as the first, via USPS certified mail with a return receipt request. Again, you sent Troy Patterson and the letter was signed for on 4-28-2008.
For your records, the tracking number for that request is: 7008 0150 0000 1951 6115. And like before, you responded by placing a 120 day late update on my Equifax report and updated my Trans Union and Experian reports. This second violation will be submitted to the Attorney General of my state and yours, the Better Business Bureau and another legal office.

You are already in violation of US Federal laws outlined in FDCPA. While it will only be a minor inconvenience for you if I choose to follow through with litigation, know this: It will only be a minor inconvenience for me as well and if you do not or cannot validate this alleged debt within the time frame set forth in the FDCPA (which have already expired) I will take this matter to the courts and it will be resolved there.

As you are already in violation, I expect all reference to this account be deleted from my credit report, as this entry and any update of such entry will be considered another violation. You have 5 days from the receipt of this letter to remove this account from any and all reporting agencies, or a complaint to the AG, BBB and FTC will be immediately filed for each and every violation from 03/10/2008 until this issue is resolved.

AFNI is well known for their belief that they are above the law and are not required to abide by any of the laws. This reputation will not serve you well when we meet in a courtroom to resolve this issue. I expect a resolution to this matter within 5 days from the date that Troy Patterson signs for this certified letter which is being sent with the tracking code of: 7008 0150 0000 1951 6146

[nosxih]

As suggested here, I sent the following email to AFNI and got an answer no less that 12 hours later. My plea finally was heard by someone who had the ability to review the account and could clearly see that it should have never been on my record. This is a truly fraudulent account and we had no part in creating it so AFNI did the right thing and deleted it! Thank you AFNI for doing what was right.

Here is my email and their reply!

MY EMAIL(a pdf of the letter that is listed in this thread was attached):
I have already file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (Ref No. 13937446) and I am prepared to go to whatever lengths I need too in order to clear this from my name.
I am sending the attached letter to AFNI via certified mail with a return receipt. This won’t be the first time I have sent a similar request to AFNI.
The account you are reporting on is fraudulent. It was created by another person. Not me. And I am frankly sick and tired of AFNI so called validating this alleged debt when it is not my account.

I received the list of people on this email from a suggestion in a forum where I went to seek help in this matter and am hoping that by sending an email along with the certified mail that I can reach someone who has the authority to review and resolve this issue. I am seeking help from legal sources as well.

It is as simple as this. If you cannot send me proper validation documentation that this debt was created by me (DW's Full name inserted here) Then by law you have no choice but to delete it.
You should know that if you cannot provide the documentation that I require, OR you do not cease collection including immediate removal of this reference form any and all credit reporting agencies
then AFNI better get their lawyers fattened up because it is going to be a long day in court and I do not intend to lose.
I have my documentation in order and am ready. Are you?

Please do not send me another letter requesting more information. I don’t have any information. AFNI is reporting this as a debt owed by me. They have the information not me.

AFNI RESPONSE emailed back to me:
MS XCXCXCXCXCXC,
This is in response to your letter to Afni, Inc., regarding the above referenced matter. It is Afni’s desire to work with consumers to assist them in resolving the questions and concerns that they may have about their accounts. In that regard, Afni, Inc. has agreed to cease collections efforts on the underlying account and close our file. Afni has requested that information pertaining to the underlying account be removed by the credit reporting agencies. You will receive written notice of that request by US mail, but should be advised that the credit reporting agencies may take up to 60 days to reflect any changes made to your credit report.

Please let me know if I may be of further assistance.

Sincerely,
Jason