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Thursday, July 02, 2009

FTC advisory opinion in favor of collectors is absolute proof of its corruption

The FTC just issued an advisory letter that left the ACA “delighted” and completely preempts the FDCPA validation requirement.

http://www.acainternational.org/files.aspx?p=/images/14382/p064803-ftc-advisory-opinion.pdf

...

After reviewing the language of the FDCPA and the Rule, and considering the goals of the statute and the regulation, the Commission concludes that a debt collector does not violate Section 805(c) of the FDCPA if the consumer directly disputes information after sending a written “cease communication” to the collector, and the collector complies with the Rule by means of a communication that has no purpose other than complying with the Rule by stating (1) the results of the investigation or (2) the collector’s belief that the communication is frivolous or irrelevant.

...

I don’t have a problem with a collector being allowed to contact a consumer despite the cease and desist to VALIDATE the account after receiving the dispute.  However, the FTC clearly ENCOURAGES collectors to simply state that they find the dispute frivolous WITHOUT validating!

Of course “somebody” should send a letter to the FTC to ask WHY collectors all of sudden don’t have to validate disputed accounts anymore.  Too bad that I’m the only person who cares and I just can’t afford to waste my time on documenting the corruption of the regulators without getting paid.

Last year I tried to start a membership organization like the ACA for consumers, but NOBODY wanted to pay a few bucks to finance these types of activities and lobby for consumer rights.  It is understandable that many people with collections don’t have a lot of extra money, but don’t tell me you don’t have $20.  So, good luck to you all!  You get what you paid for.

And speaking of payments, here are my FTC complaints on behalf of paying clients:

http://credit-reporting-collection-ftc-complaints.info/

Wednesday, July 01, 2009

The Vantage Score FRAUD—it’s NOT the score used by lenders!

I just tried to get my free annual credit report from Trans Union and it is so incredibly irritating to see how people are DEFRAUDED by the credit bureaus.

Christine, we want to let you know what’s changed since your last visit.

TransUnion is pleased to feature VantageScore, the only credit score developed and used by all three national credit bureaus.

We know you’ll enjoy this new credit score because of the following valuable benefits:

Easy-to-understand—each score includes an academic grade, so you’ll automatically know how you rank

Consistent—since it’s used by all three credit bureaus, there’s no guessing about your credit

Accurate—based upon extensive knowledge and data to ensure you’ll receive a score that accurately represents your credit profile.

Please note that your VantageScore is based upon a different score range than past credit scores you may have accessed through TransUnion. Your score will now range from 501-990, with 990 being the highest score.

Christine, we’re confident that once you see your VantageScore, you’ll agree that change is a good thing!

UNBELIEVABLE!

It’s time for a published FTC complaint about the CRAs’ credit scoring fraud.

These scores are NOT used to rate mortgages and MOST credit applications.

I’m working on my response to the TU motion for summary judgment and that’s why I’m getting my credit report—otherwise I wouldn’t bother getting the TU report.  And, as usually, I can’t get my free annual report and that idiotic TU system defaults to TrueCredit and their incomplete reports.  So I had to order their monitoring and that’s even more aggravating.  From being unable to enter my correct address “103-156” (no hyphens allowed) to the OBNOXIOUS ads and TU’s aggressive marketing of CRAP and FRAUD.

Also please see the recently UPDATED Credit Scoring Basics for more info on credit scores.

Obama’s new consumer protection agency to regulate collectors?

Here’s the collection industry’s view on the prospect of regulation by Obama’s new consumer protection agency:

ARM Firms to Get New Regulator Under Treasury Proposal Issued this Week
July 1, 2009

The Obama administration made it official yesterday in releasing a proposal for a new consumer protection agency: the ARM industry will be included in the reforms. And it’s not just the FDCPA; FCRA and Gramm-Leach-Bliley are included.

by Cynthia Wilson
insideARM
July 1, 2009

Calls to transfer the administration of the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA) to another federal regulator intensified this week when the Obama administration, through the U.S. Treasury Department, on Tuesday unveiled its plan to create an independent consumer protection agency.

The Consumer Financial Protection Agency Act of 2009 would give the new agency the authority to oversee all consumer protection laws and write new rules to protect consumers against deceptive and unfair practices. The act specifically defines the FDCPA as an existing law that would fall under the purview of the new agency. Furthermore, it proposes to amend the FDCPA to replace current regulator the Federal Trade Commission with the new agency in most language.

The proposal confirms speculation last week that the debt collection law would fall under the authority of the new agency ("Proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency May Oversee FDCPA Enforcement,” June 25).

“This agency will have only one mission – to protect consumers – and have the authority and accountability to make sure that consumer-protection regulations are written fairly and enforced vigorous,” Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said when he unveiled the legislation.

Sen. Christopher Dodd, chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, immediately praised the legislation saying, “the Administration is addressing the colossal failures that led to the economic crisis with a bold and aggressive plan. Creating an independent agency whose sole focus is protecting consumers - be it credit card holders, anyone with a bank account, or families with mortgages or student loans – is really the key to creating the foundations for a stronger economy.”

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), however, which currently regulates FDCPA, doesn’t appear ready to relinquish oversight of the debt collection law.  In a report last February, the commission requested that Congress to give it the authority to make and implement FDCPA rules.

Kathleen Day, spokeswoman for the Center for Responsible Lending, a non-partisan, non-profit research and policy group, said she doesn’t expect the FTC or any agency overseeing consumer protection laws to abdicate their authority easily.

“A lot of agencies will fight,” to retain their authority, she said. “That’s what happens when changes comes in Washington.”

But Day said she believes there’s a lot of momentum on Capitol Hill to make the agency a reality.

“This (economic bailout) is a big crisis and taxpayers are really mad.  Regulators abdicated their role in protecting consumers to the banks.  You can’t have safety and soundness if you abuse the consumer,” she said.

Legislation to create an independent body to look out for consumer interest was first introduced last March by Democrat Rep. William Delahunt of Massachusetts.  Last week Delahunt reiterated his support along with others during a hearing on enhancing financial products regulation before the House Committee on Financial Services. Likewise, Committee Chairman Rep. Barney Frank said he wants the committee to pass legislation to create the agency by the end of July and hopes that a bill addressing the panel and other parts of the President’s financial regulatory plan will clear Congress this fall.

Under the Treasury Department’s proposal, in addition to overseeing the FDCPA, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency would regulate the Alternative Mortgage Transaction Parity Act; the Community Reinvestment Act; the Consumer Leasing Act; the Electronic Funds Transfer Act; the Equal Credit Opportunity Act; the Fair Credit Billing Act; the Fair Credit Reporting Act; the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, and several other consumer protection laws.

It is absurd that the FTC wants to continue “enforcement” only to be able to NOT enforce.  They’re fighting to be able to to protect the big collection firms and banks.

I haven’t read anything yet on FCRA enforcement which has been effectively halted since Bush took office in 2000.

And, while it’s nice to dream about a consumer protection agency that does its job, we might as well believe in Santa Claus.  Obama is OWNED by the bankers and Wallstreet.  For details, watch the Obama Deception.

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Komarova v. National Credit - litigation privilege not applicable to Robbins-Rosenthal Act

If you’re NOT in California, you have NO recourse against a debt collector who harasses you and sues you for a disputed debt?  Only the damages awarded due to violations of the CALIFORNIA Robbins-Rosenthal Act were upheld on appeal and apparently FDCPA claims were dismissed in district court?

This is also a very interesting case because the thugs at the National Arbitration Forum actually found in favor of National Credit Acceptance and apparently Komarova knew nothing about the proceedings.  I’m currently working with a client who received notice of the claim filed with the NAF by REGULAR mail.  OBVIOUSLY, many people don’t even receive these letters.

What kind of “justice” system is this when they don’t even have to serve the arbitration notice by certified mail? 

It’s the American way of corruption.

I’ll have to do some research about the recent actions by California regulators about NAF abuses.

Here’s the article about Komarova and the fraudulent MBNA debt:

Metropolitan News-Enterprise

Monday, June 29, 2009

C.A.: Debt Collection Abuses Not Shielded by Litigation Privilege

By SHERRI M. OKAMOTO, Staff Writer

The First District Court of Appeal has upheld an award of nearly $200,000 in damages to a San Francisco woman subjected to debt collection abuses due to a case of mistaken identity.

In its decision Thursday, Div. One clarified that the litigation privilege did not shield conduct violating the Robbins-Rosenthal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, but it did bar a cause of action for the intentional infliction of emotional distress and reduced Anastasiya Komarova’s award against National Credit Acceptance Inc. accordingly.

National purchased a delinquent credit card account with an unpaid balance of $7,872.98 for “Anastasia Komarova” from MBNA America Bank N.A. in December 2004.

After National obtained a credit report for Anastasiya Komarova which misspelled her name, listed addresses for her in the San Francisco Bay Area, and did not identify any accounts with MBNA, the debt collection company began calling Komarova at her work.

A receptionist at Komarova’s workplace described the calls as “quite persistent and rude.” Komarova said she repeatedly informed callers, who would not identify the company they represented, that the debt was not hers, to no avail.

Arbitration Award

In March 2005, National filed a claim on the debt with the National Arbitration Forum against “Anastasia Komarova,” who was listed at an address in Long Beach. An arbitrator later issued National an award of $11,214.33, which included amounts for accrued interest and attorney fees.

Komarova said that a caller agreed to send a “verification of debt” form in July 2005 which, for the first time, provided her with National’s name and address, and she filed a police report with authorities in San Francisco asserting possible fraud.

The spa which employed Komarova closed in November 2005, and callers to the spa’s phone number were directed by a message to alternate numbers, which were cell phone numbers belonging to the spa’s owner, Komarova’s father-in-law, and Komarova’s husband.

Both men testified that collection calls to the spa continued into December 2005 and that they received calls from National on their cell phones, which they did not answer, until January 2006.

A petition to confirm the NAF arbitration award was served on Komarova in February 2006. The petition was set for a hearing in the Los Angeles Superior Court.

Collection Efforts End

After Komarova retained an attorney to represent her on the petition, which she maintained she knew nothing about, National took the scheduled hearing off calendar. National took no further action to collect the debt from Komarova.

Komarova subsequently filed suit against National, but all her causes of action other than those for violations of the Robbins-Rosenthal Act and for intentional infliction of emotional distress were summarily adjudicated in National’s favor. 

Trial proceeded with San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ernest Goldsmith presiding, and the jury returned special verdicts finding that National had violated several provisions of the act, awarding her $197,905 in damages.

In a separate special verdict the jury also found National liable for intentional infliction of emotional distress and awarded $67,905 in damages, plus $75,000 in punitive damages.

Writing for the appellate court, Presiding Justice James J. Marchiano noted that several federal district courts had addressed the applicability of the litigation privilege to the Robbins-Rosenthal Act and found that the act prevailed over the privilege.

He posited that the act would be “significantly inoperable” if the privilege did not yield when the two were in conflict as “unfair debt collection practices could be immunized merely by filing suit on the debt.”

However, Marchiano emphasized that those same federal cases finding the privilege inapplicable to Robbins-Rosenthal Act claims nevertheless held that it precluded claims for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and such authority dictated the same outcome here.

Marchiano then rejected National’s statute of limitations defense because the debt collection company’s attempts to collect from Komarova were not abandoned until she was served with the petition to confirm the arbitration award, an event that occurred within the one-year limitations period.

Additionally, he explained that the harassing phone calls, which continued into December 2005, were a continuing course of conduct that extended into the limitations period, even if Komarova and her family did not answer them, as the act does not require calls be answered for them to be actionable.

As for National’s challenge to the award of attorney fees, Marchiano said Komarova was entitled to reasonable attorney fees on appeal attributable to the defense of the judgment on her claims under the Robbins-Rosenthal Act.

Although use of a lodestar multiplier was appropriate, the trial court erred by basing its decision to grant a multiplier on the necessity of private enforcement of the Robbins-Rosenthal Act, the justice said.

Joined by Justice Sandra L. Margulies and retired Marin Superior Court Judge Stephen Graham, sitting by assignment, Marchiano reversed the attorney fee award for reconsideration and modified the judgment to eliminate the intentional infliction of emotional distress claim and punitive damages.

The case is Komarova v. National Credit Acceptance, Inc., 09 S.O.S. 3917.

Copyright 2009, Metropolitan News Company

For every one of the few consumers who find attorneys to represent them there are MANY THOUSANDS who get railroaded in our wonderful “justice” system.

Monday, June 29, 2009

Lexington bribed the FTC?  Another worthless FTC credit repair settlement

These LIARS at the FTC:

“The FTC advises that only time, effort, and a personal debt repayment plan can improve your credit report.”

If you want to do me a HUGE favor, please file a complaint about me and my claims that YES, I CAN get you substantially higher credit scores if you are willing to PAY me, possibly settle some debts and you have the guts to sue in the corrupt US courts.

Contact info is in the FTC press release below, I’d love to be able to put on the record how STUPID these morons are.  It makes my blood boil to see their outrageous lies.

Please see my complaints to the FTC and the FTC doing NOTHING to stop the most egregious and malicious systemic incorrect credit reporting:

http://credit-reporting-collection-ftc-complaints.info/

And to add insult to injury, they’re going after some wannabe credit repair outfit with so few customers, they can’t even pay the fine. 

This is NOT a coincidence, but part of the grand scheme to have the average person get scammed by credit repair outfits while doing NOTHING to force the CRAs, creditors and collectors to comply with the law.

Things are EXACTLY as the FTC and the Obama administration want them to be.

And they’re leaving Lexington alone!

I see the FALSE Lexington claims all the time right here in the Google ads.  Lexington pays a LOT of money for every click on these ads because their scam is so profitable.

What’s going on?

Who at the FTC is on the Lexington payroll?

Below is the 6/25/09 FTC press release:

‘Credit Repair’ Operation Settles with FTC; Company Made False Claims and Charged Illegal Up-Front Fees

A federal court has ordered a credit repair operation and its principals to stop making false claims and requiring advance payment for credit repair services. The agreed-upon court orders are a result of a settlement between the Federal Trade Commission and the “credit repair” defendants.

The Commission sued the defendants in October 2008 as part of “Operation Clean Sweep,” a crackdown on credit repair operations. The defendants represented that they could remove negative but accurate information from consumers’ credit reports, including bankruptcies and late fees. According to the FTC, the defendants charged consumers up to $59.95 initially, then $59.95 per month, to send letters to credit reporting agencies disputing information on the consumers’ credit reports. Contrary to the defendants’ representations to consumers, those dispute letters failed to remove accurate negative information from the consumers’ credit reports.

The orders bar the defendants from violating the Credit Repair Organizations Act by charging clients fees in advance and claiming that a credit repair organization can permanently remove negative information from credit reports, even when the information is accurate. They also bar the defendants from making deceptive claims when marketing any product or service, including credit repair services.

The orders further prohibit the defendants from collecting money from consumers who purchased their services before December 3, 2008, when the court halted their unlawful practices, and from disclosing or benefitting from customers’ personally identifiable or financial information. The orders require them to take reasonable measures to protect consumers’ personally identifiable information during its disposal.

The order against Ace Group, Inc., doing business as American Credit Experts, Inc., The Ace Group, Inc., The Ace Group, and ACE; Legal Credit Repair Center, Inc.; Michael Singer, and Gerald Roth, imposes a $20,645,754 judgment that will be suspended if Singer and Roth pay $5,000 each because of their inability to pay the full judgment. The order against Melvin Kessler also imposes a $20,645,754 judgment, which is suspended based on his inability to pay. If the defendants are found to have misrepresented their financial condition, the full judgments will become due immediately. The orders also contain record-keeping and reporting provisions to allow the FTC to monitor compliance with the orders.

The FTC advises that only time, effort, and a personal debt repayment plan can improve your credit report. The first step is to learn what information is in your credit report. Federal law requires that the nationwide consumer reporting companies – Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion – provide you with a free copy of your credit report once every 12 months, if you ask for it. To order your free report, visit annualcreditreport.com, call 1-877-322-8228, or complete and mail the Annual Credit Report Request Form. If you find errors or mistakes in your credit report, federal law gives you the right to have them corrected – free of charge. Credit repair information is available in “Credit Repair: How to Help Yourself,” at http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/credit/cre13.shtm.

The Commission vote authorizing staff to file each of the stipulated final orders was 4-0. The orders were filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida and were entered by the court on June 3 and June 15, 2009.

NOTE: Stipulated court orders are for settlement purposes only and do not necessarily constitute an admission by the defendants of a law violation. Stipulated orders have the force of law when signed by the judge.

The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint in English or Spanish, visit the FTC’s online Complaint Assistant or call 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357). The FTC enters complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to more than 1,500 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. The FTC’s Web site provides free information on a variety of consumer topics.

MEDIA CONTACT:
Frank Dorman
Office of Public Affairs
202-326-2674
STAFF CONTACT:
Leonard L. Gordon
FTC’s Northeast Region
212-607-2829

Michele Stolls
FTC’s Northeast Region
212-607-2834

Robin Eichen
FTC’s Northeast Region
212-607-2803
(Ace Group)
(FTC File No. X090003