The Ugly Side Of Debt Collection Companies

Debt collection harassment often takes ugly turns, with debt collectors resorting in sleazy, underhanded techniques. If you believe that debt collectors are a sophisticated lot, it is time to reconsider your opinion. In fact, in what can be termed a spine-chilling incident, a debt collector operated despite being in prison.

Lamont Cooper from New York owns Legal Action recovery, a debt collection agency. While Mr. Cooper served time in prison, he continued to operate his collection agency, continuing the same terrible tactics which were business as usual prior to his incarceration.

Prison surveillance shows that he corresponded with his employees and demanded they inform him of all banking activities. The New York Attorney General's office filed charges against him for continuing business from prison. He will be arraigned after he is discharged form federal custody.

To understand exactly how the debt collection business works, and such situations occur, one newspaper reporter turned debt collector for three months. Afterwards, his confessions included how unpaid bills are considered a boon by debt collectors. His stint at the collection agency taught him some hard truths. Motivated strictly by cash, collectors manipulate, shame and threaten people into paying, without caring whether the bill is legitimate. If they do not do this, their superior takes them to task. The cash benefits of collecting are huge and encouraging enough for collectors to use unethical means.

Debt collection is a massive industry where each debt collection agent is trained in collection tactics. Each agent makes roughly 150 to 200 calls per day. They are taught to pose as paralegals or even attorneys, give financial advice should the debtor opt to settle, try harassing techniques, and so on. At the end of the day a collection agent must have completed his quota of calls and deals.

Typically debt collection training – at least that which is publicly disclosed – requires a debt collector to be polite and well-mannered over the phone, and to close the call on a pleasant note. But the real debt collectors are far from this description. They use abusive and illegal methods and routinely violate the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) , the federal law established to ensure fair debt collection, enforced by the Federal trade Commission and private litigants. If you have been the victim of these methods, an experienced debt collection attorney can help you to put a stop to it, and to obtain justice for what you have suffered.