Midland Credit Management
Unlawful Collection Harrasment ripoff

I have read a number of reports on this site referring to the questionable practices of MCM. My problem is simply one of trying to get them to stop calling me, and to stop sending collection letters.

Sometime in the late 1990's my mother and father began to receive phone calls from a company called "Fingerhut" trying to collect on an unpaid debt on an account with the same first and last name as my father. They were informed that we NEVER did busines with Fingerhut and that they had the wrong person, by the same name.

My father was in his late 70's at the time, didn't owe anyone a dollar, and became quite frustrated at the repeated collection calls. Finally he was informed that he needed to fill out a form to question the claim. He was asked for his address so that a form could be sent to him. Unfortunately he provided his address in an honest attempt to put an end to the matter, but then began receiving collection notices with his address tied to an account number and a bogus debt. Repeated collection calls continued, as did correspondence requesting they stop.

Finally we recieved an unimpressive looking letter with a New York lawyers name, saying it was all a big mistake and they would stop all collection activities. This was around the year 2000.

My father passed away in 2003.

Recently I (his son) began to recieve collection letters from MCM in his name, and after a short internet search, found out that MCM is a collection agency that has purchased uncollected debts from Fingerhut. Now the whole process of collection letters and collection phone calls has begun again. I have a different phone number at the same address, and recieved a call looking for my father, who is deceased. Out of curiousity who was looking for him after numerous calls, I said "speaking" when his name was requested. After realizing it was a collection call from MCM, I explained that (1) I was his son, and (2) he was deceased, and (3) that this was not a debt that had anything to do with him in the first place.

Someone from MCM called me everyday after that for about two weeks until I thought I finally got through to them that they were wasting their time calling the wrong person and requesting a dead person. For those of you who have lost a parent I am sure you can imagine how aggravating this was.

Today, a few months after that last phone call, I recieved another collection letter in my fathers name from MCM and fear this whole process is about to start all over again. My message machine also has daily messages on it requesting me to press "1" to speak to someone regarding my account. (I think I know who those mysterious calls were from).

My first response is to just ignore these letters and calls as I know it is virtually impossible to prove a debt that was never incurred and absolutely impossible to get money from a dead person. The problem is that my Mother is also aged and recieves these letters and calls and takes them seriously. They have requested her Social Security Number and thankfully after seeing what they did with her address, she would not give this info.

Frankly enough is enough. Harrassng old people and family members for debts they never incurred, and which a company has no business trying to collect must be illegal. Repeated requests to put this matter to an end just result in temporary stops, and then it starts all over again.

I am not overly interested in wasting time filing court papers, but is this my only option? Any advice would be welcome.

Company: Midland Credit Management
Country: USA
State: California
City: San Diego
Address: 8875 Aero Drive
Phone: 8009354566

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