We are a small business and had our first unfortunate situation of a non-paying customer about 6 months ago... Something I suppose will eventually happen to all businesses.
I was searching online and found the Ficka & Associates website, www.usacreditrecovery.com and thought I'd give them a try. What a massive mistake! I was originally dealing with a Stephen Scheckman who was a fast talking sales guy who I decided to go with simply because he called me everyday for a week. Apparently he was fired the day after signing me up... First bad sign.
A little while after signing up my client contacted me and wanted to make arrangements to pay after all, so I contacted Ficka & Assoc repeatedly for a month to figure out how to work that. No one ever responded to my calls. Then, I called to speak with the manager who told me to forward my emails and info to him and he would take care of me. Never got back to me.
As a couple months went by I more or less wrote off Ficka & Associates. They claim to call and give you a monthly report on the status of your collection. Yea, they call every month alright. A new person calls every time with no idea about your account trying to get more business from you. They kept calling and I kept telling them how bad they were. 4 times they called and 4 times I told them the story. Every single time they apologized and said they would look into it and get right back to me... Yea ok.
Then about 2 months ago, they called me to inform me that they couldn't collect on the debt and that the account would be canceled and tried to get more business. I told them no thanks, and figured that would be the end of my relationship with "just another bad company."
1.5 Months ago they call me and out of the middle of nowhere give me an update on that debt collection... As if they were still trying to collect on it. I told them they called and canceled the account over a month ago, and sales person told me that wasn't on the computer. I told her about my terrible experience with them and that I didn't want the account reinstate... We hung up and I was just speechless.
A week later I received a bill in the mail telling me that because I canceled the account I would be billed!
I called and asked to speak with a manager. The sales women and I had it out on the phone because she lied for a while and told me there was no manager. Until I told her what happened, that I was contacting the Better Business Bureau and that I wouldn't pay anthing, then I was put in touch with the manager.
They put me on hold for fifteen minutes, they he gets right on the phone and he accused me of trying to scam them out of money! Didn't listen to a word I said and kept interrupting me while telling him my experience, and told me that they have lawyers working for them and it would be quite easy to throw my bill in with their collections! I couldn't believe what I was hearing!
Then after explaining to him again that they called and canceled the account he told me I couldn't prove that. Then I pointed out their claim that if they can't collect a debt, they don't charge anything. He responded with "how do you expect us to collect a debt from someone with no money?"... Ummmm does anyone see anything wrong with this? He then said "our bottom line is you're going to pay us one way or another"... He actually said those words!
He then told me if I gave them more business he might waive the fee. Luckily I have no non-paying customers so I told him to reinstate my "canceled" debt to make this go away which he eventually did!
I have never had such a bad experience with a company to prompt me leaving a lengthy online report of what happened.
In all my life of being in business I have NEVER dealt with such poor customer service, rudeness on the part of ALL employees including management, or an overall sense that Ficka & Associates is ONE BIG SCAM.
Unfortunately before realizing what they were I referred an associate over to them to collect a debt, and he is dealing with a similarly disgusting situation.
I will be reporting these guys to the Better Business Bureau and hope that someone shuts them down someday.in my free time I plan on sharing this story on every credit/business report website I can find!
Moral of the story is STAY CLEAR of Ficka & Associates... Aka usacreditrecovery.com and William Ficka. This is one SHADY business!
Jack cherub
Boston, Massachusetts
U.S.A.
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