NCO Continues to Violate the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act
Note to all consumers regarding nco financial systems are your rights may have been violated:
A man in Texas is suing NCO Financial Systems Inc. Under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), claiming in his suit that NCO representatives called his place of employment and informed the man's boss they were calling for a debt he owed. The alleged debt was for a $47 unauthorized, fraudulent charge made by someone else on the plaintiff's Wal-mart credit card.
In Donnie Schakosky v. NCO Financial Systems, filed in the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas, on Aug. 30, Schakosky claims that his boss told the NCO representative that Schakosky was not allowed to receive personal calls of that nature at work and asked that NCO not call Schakosky at that number.
NCO completely ignored these requests and continued to call Mr. Schakosky at this workplace, the lawsuit charges. NCO's calls were repeated and harassing. These calls have affected Schakosk's job performance and caused him to suffer a loss of reputation with his employer.
The suit claims NCO's representatives told Schakosky that it would report the debt to the credit bureaus, making it impossible for Schakosky to buy anything in the future, and told him it would garnish his wages if he did not pay the debt.
NCO's activities violated nine sections of the FDCPA regarding unlawful communications, harassment and abuse and false or misleading representations, according to the suit.
The lawsuit also claims that NCO's conduct violated sections of the Texas Debt Collection Act and Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act and that, under state common law claims, NCO invaded Schakosky's privacy by way of intrusion that was unreasonable, unjustified or unwarranted.
Schakosky is demanding a jury trial and is seeking actual and punitive damages, litigation and court costs, and attorney's fees.
Stories like this are becoming wide spread. The problem is, as a former employee of NCO Financial Systems in Horsham, Pennsylvania, I received an education on how this debt collection giant violates the FDCPA and several state statutes. You may have already been a victim.
The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act protects consumers from collection agency misconduct including harassment, abuse and false reporting of credit information. Unfortunately, NCO has been found liable for their abhorrent abuses and violations of the FDCPA. A few years ago, the company paid estimated fines totaling $1.5 million and has been the subject of investigations by several states including Pennsylvania, Texas and California. Reports of collector abuses are becoming more common as this giant continues to acquire smaller collection agencies and firms.
Among some of the questionable collection practices was NCO Portfolio Management's purchase of Chase Providian debt.in many cases, these debts were not valid, released in a previous bankruptcy or fell into federal and state statutes of limitations. Yet, only paying pennies on the dollar for the debt, NCO quickly began to collect on this old debt regardless of its validity. While acting as a correspondence analyst for NCO, I notated several accounts where the company illegally attempted from consumers who had declared bankruptcy over a decade earlier. Chase Providian was unable to provide NCO with bankruptcy information, but senior management still proceeded with debt collection practices even though there was reasonable evidence that the Chase Providian debts were not valid. Several consumer complaints and disputes poured in by the thousands, but NCO in many cases maintained the unverifiable debt was valid and continued its pursuit of invalidated debt that in some cases was two decades old.
NCO's violations did not stop with purchasing old debts and illegally attempting to collect on them.in the fall of in order to circumvent FDCPA statutes, possible legal action and fines, top executives in the Horsham, Pennsylvania office made the decision to store nearly 25,000 consumer and attorney letters and correspondence with Iron Mountain, a third party vendor, rather than respond to the disputes and complaints. The efforts were thwarted when security was alerted only hours before the correspondence was to be shipped. The decision to silence consumers by storing outdated mail could have resulted in thousands of disputes being ignored. Recently, in December the company stored another 20,000 consumer letters on their electronic imaging system. You could have been one of these consumers who suffered higher interest rates, the reporting of incorrect and damaging credit bureau information or illegally subjected to collection activity as your request for a dispute may have not been handled in a timely fashion.
Earlier this spring, top NCO executives meet with management and supervision to discuss the increase in legal action due to violations of FDCPA committed by NCO employees. Again, if your requests for harassing phone calls to stop or demand that incorrect credit bureau information not be removed have been ignored, you are most likely a victim of NCO and you have a right to have your grievance heard. Therefore, you need to educate yourself regarding your rights under the FDCPA. Not only was I an employee of NCO, I too suffered when I learned the NCO Medclear Division was reporting erroneous information on my credit bureau file and that information was listed three separate times. Their actions lead to my credit score being lowered.
If you believe NCO has violated your rights under the FDCPA or any related state law, you may have a right to seek damages. As I am a former employee of the company and witnessed many of these egregious violations of the law, I may be able to answer questions you may have regarding NCO's collection practices and if they violate the FDPCA. As more and more consumers educate themselves and seek legal action against the world's largest collection firm, you too may be able to seek damages for illegal acts committed against you.
Together, we can make collection agencies such as NCO accountable for their actions. The time has come to stop the harassment and illegal collection activities that could affect your financial stability and future.
Contact me your complaint or post it here as possible class action is being considered against NCO Financial Systems. You have a right to be heard and have your concerns addressed should any action be brought against the company.
John
Horsham, Pennsylvania
U.S.A.
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