Wow! First & foremost, I am so glad that I found this website. When I searched for UCB, I immediately got chills - the comments in almost all of the posts matched our current situation w / this horrible company. I have learned so much from these postings, not only about the horrible business practices of UCB, but also of the laws of debt collecting and our rights as consumers. I really wish I would've know then what I know now, and I've only scratched the surface of my knowledge of my rights.
Here's how our story starts out...
We had an account with CitiBank that I got a few months behind on.in early January of I contacted CitiBank to setup a payment plan and was told that the account was now with United Collections Bureau, and the saga began.
Initially, I spoke with a male by the name of "Godwin Carty" (800-210-3534 x 3976). To this day, I'm still not sure if I'm spelling his name right, because each time I asked for clarification of the spelling, whether it be from the "Ms. Something-or-Other" that answered the phone that day or from "Mr. Carty" himself, I was given multiple answers, or they would just agree to what I was offering as a possible spelling. (For the record, "Mr. Carty" has an interesting accent - it almost sounds as if he's from the Carribean - for what it's worth.)
My initial conversations with "Mr. Carty" were fairly reasonable. Never was I informed, per the FDCPA, "that they are attempting to collect a debt and (b) that information obtained will be used for that purpose". All I was told was that they had received my account from CitiBank and I needed to pay them $7k plus. (Now, I know that I had an account with CitiBank, and because CitiBank told me, I knew that UCB now had my account. Little did I know that the next 10 weeks would be a living hell.
"Mr. Carty" began by telling me that they needed all of the debt paid to keep it from going to their legal department. I explained to him that I did not have those types of funds readily available, and needed to setup a payment plan. He put me on hold (which he did numerous times each time I spoke with him) and came back with an initial plan, of $2300 now, and the rest payable over the period of two months. I again explained to him that even at that amount, I did not have those funds readily available to me.
Back on hold again I go - he returns and asks me how much can I send; I told him that I would need to review our finances and get back with him the next day - which I did. I called him back and told him that we could have $800 by Jan 25, and that we could commit to making a $300 monthly payment, each month on the 25th. He told me that he didn't think this would be enough to keep it from going to "legal" but that he would do everything he could for us. Again, he appeared to be working with us.
He then told us that they needed to verify our bank account information and brought another lady on the line, "Ms. Something". We provided UCB with an alternate bank account number to have the funds withdrawn from (I didn't want them to have our personal checking account information) and verified the account number at LEAST 3 times.
A couple of days after the funds were to be withdrawn from the account, we received another phone call from "Mr. Carty" that the account number we provided was invalid - when in all reality, they had transposed the account number - thus they couldn't withdraw the initial $800 payment. Once that was corrected (again, verifying the account number multiple times) the funds were withdrawn a few days later. To date, we still have yet to receive a notice for that withdrawal, stating that the funds were going to be withdrawn from our account, for $800. This should've been done per the FDCPA, Public Law 95-109, Section 808 (2).
Fast-forward to the first part of February; UCB called us almost hourly, just about every day of the week (including Sundays) to inquire about the next payment, which, by the previous conversation, had been setup, or so I thought, to occur on the 25th of each month.
About the middle of February, we received a letter from UCB notifying us that funds would be withdrawn from our account on Feb 19, for $300. This was the first letter we had received from UCB. Upon receipt of the letter, we filed it with the rest of our bills and added it to the cash-flow budget. On Feb 14th, our middle daughter (We have 4 children, ages 20 mos. To 13 years old - I work full-time and my wife has 3 part-time jobs) became very ill, which resulted in hospitalization.
We knew that we had the payment coming up, and since we were spending our days and nights by her bedside, we hadn't had the opportunity to transfer the funds to the alternate account, so I attempted to contact UCB (another number - 877-387-3453) to provide them an update as to our status. For three nights, I attempted to call UCB 2-3 times a night for three nights straight and each night it was the same scenario..."please hold while your call is transferred to the next available agent"... About 30 seconds of silence..."please hold while your call is transferred to the next available agent" another 10 seconds of silence and then a busy signal. There was no option for voicemail, no options for a secretary, nothing.
After things had calmed down with our daughter, we received an NSF notification from our bank stating that an attempt to withdraw funds from that account was returned due to NSF. This made sense because, as stated above, we didn't have the opportunity to transfer the funds and no one would answer my calls when I tried to call them!"Mr. Carty" had told me that their office hours were 830 am - 11 pm EST. If those are the office hours, why isn't anyone answering the phones?
Since we had received hourly phone calls from UCB, I knew that they would eventually call and when they did, I would have the opportunity to setup the next payment and move forward. That call came today, March 5, from a horrible, rude, condescending member of the male species who goes by "Mr. Bond" (I think, again, he wouldn't take the time to spell his name, quoting "it was not important" - but more on that later).
He called our home and when my wife answered, he went up one side and down the other - each time she tried to offer an explanation, he cut her off, was rude, condescending, arrogant, and each step of the way, his threats become more and more harsh. At one point, he even said "Oh lady, just stop with the crocodile tears!!! Don't have your husband call me... You better have your lawyer call me!" Many references were made to reposession of our home, our car and the freezing of any assets that we had. If we didn't come up with $7k, this was going to the legal department and we were going to be sued, and on, and on, and on.
Obviously, this deeply upset my wife and she called me at work, sobbing, and told me about what just transpired. Not haveing a contact number for "Mr. Bond", I immediately called "Mr. Godwin" and received his voice mail. I left him a message that I would be calling back within 30 minutes. I called back and he actually answered (small miracle). He answered the phone very abruptly and immediately put me on hold, not even knowing who I was. After a minute or so, he came on the line and I introduced myself. He immediately put me on hold again, "Hang on" he said. Another minute goes by, he comes back on the line and says "What do you need?" I explained that we had received a call and I was calling to setup our regulary scheduled monthly payment, while beginning to offer an explanation as to why our payment was 10 days late and he cut me off and transferred me to the notorius "Mr. Bond".
"Mr. Bond" started in on me somewhat like he started out on my wife - "you can make this personal or you can make this business... Your best bet is to make this business". When I tried to collect his name, he told me it wasn't important; "what is important, is that you pay this debt". Again, I asked for his name and the spelling; he repeated his name as "Mr. Bond" with the "legal department" but would never confirm the spelling.
He started in on me, as he did my wife, that if the debt was not paid immediately, that our house and car would be repossessed, our assets would be frozen and my check would be garnished. He continued to talk-down to me and was very condescending, even as I attempted to explain our most recent situation and he would not hear it. Again stating that this was not personal - it was business, and it would be within my best interest to keep it on a business level. I told him that he had already been condescending to my wife and that if he wanted this to be kept "as business" he needed to drop the condescending tone with me.
I told him that "Mr. Carty" and I had verbally agreed to make an inital good-faith payment of $800 and then a monthly payment of $300. His response was "we dont setup payment plans - that's not our business. Whoever communicated that to you on the first call should've never done that."
Each time I would attempt to speak in a mild manner, he would not hear it, and would interrupt me, spouting the terror he was going to bring down on us if we didn't pay the debt. "If you don't pay this immediately, we are going to send this to legal and they are going to sue you." I told him that I did not have $7k readily available to me. At this time, he offered a settlement of $4960 (this was the first time a 'settlement' was EVER offered), payable within 24 hours, or this would go to legal. He then said that they were not going to call us anymore (yeah right) and that I needed to call him in 24 hours and let him know what we were going to do. Oh, and he even offered to do me a favor - how sweet. He said if I gave him the tracking number of the overnighted check, he would send an email to the legal department and tell them to hold off on litigation. (Insert vomiting sounds here)
Needless to say, due to my lack of knowledge earlier today, I was very intimidated and quite frankly, I was scared. Scared because he rattled my wife, and she doesn't get rattled, and scared that we would lose our home, car, and potentially, my job due to the garnishment threat. We are still a bit frazzled by all of this, and yes, still a bit scared.
This site has helped us out so much - I was definitely glad to know that we aren't the first ones to be strong-armed by this company, and unfortunately, we probably won't be the last.
So our post is two-fold; 1.) to share our story and receive any feedback from those of you out there on what our next steps should be (We know we need to a.) file a complaint with the FTC, b.) NEVER talk to them on the phone again, c.) request that they confirm the debt, also d.) request that they cease and desist their phone calls, at home and at the office e.) request that they send a letter detailing the 'verbal' settlement offer quoted to me by "Mr. Bond") AND 2.) align with anyone out there who would be interested in putting this company OUT OF BUSINESS!!! They are truly evil!
(Sorry this post was so long!)
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