"In 1978, Congress passed the Fair Financial obligation Collections Practices Act (FDCPA). That act forbade debt collectors from engaging in harassing and abusive conduct in order to collect debts.

It was a problem then; it is still an issue now. According to the Federal Trade Commission, 2008 saw a rise in grievances of 10 percent over 2007. (The total for 2008 was 78,838; for 2007, 71,004.) That isn't the only year there has actually been an increase. In fact, because the passage of the FDCPA, the number of problems of unfair or violent debt collection practices made to the Federal Trade Commission have risen every year. The reality is that considering that the passage of the FDCPA claims of violent and harassing conduct from debt collectors has actually increased progressively.

You 'd believe that a law targeting specific practices of financial obligation debt collector would mean that they would alter those practices. But the statistics state different.

Why is this?

The proof recommends financial obligation debt collection agency did make modifications after the passage of the FDCPA. They had to take notification of the act and react to it seriously since of the potential for liability. Though much of the cases are for much smaller amounts, in 2009, for instance, one Montana jury returned a verdict of $311,000 for offenses of the FDCPA-and that didn't even consist of lawyer's costs. That decision and many others show that financial obligation collection agencies who breach the FDCPA can be required to pay loan damages for their conduct. That is a possible liability. So debt debt collection agency couldn't neglect it and a lot of them haven't. So why all the problems still?

There are 2 reasons for this:

1) The rewards in financial obligation collection are incorrect, and

2) The individuals are oblivious of the rights they have when they deal with financial obligation collection firms.

Numerous collection companies have instituted programs to train their bill collectors on compliance with the FDCPA. They train them so that the debt collectors will know what is legal and what is not when they get in touch with people to get them to pay their financial obligations.

Up until now so excellent.

However something occurs between that training and the time bill collectors begin contacting debtors who owe money.

So what is it?

It is loan. What takes place is money. Financial obligation collector's deal with an incentive program; the more loan they generate for the firm the more cash they make. Simply put, the more they bring in, the fatter their paycheck is. To generate that more loan for the agency, the FDCPA is frequently tossed out the window.

It's more effective in collecting loan that way. After all, to threaten to sue or to threaten to call the cops and put you in jail or to threaten to take your paycheck or your home or to threaten to speak with your pals or to your employer or to subject you to ridicule or violent language or phone call at all hours-all of these and a lot more are just too efficient to skip. An individual frightened of losing what he has or of losing his task or credibility is going to move paradise and earth to get the loan to settle the debt. Which is exactly what the collector's want-- that you pay the debt quickly and move paradise and earth to do it. Those threats are the reward to get you to pay that will trigger their collection numbers to increase which indicates a fat paycheck.

And who's going to understand anyway? Most people who have gone through harassing and abusive financial obligation collection practices will not know their rights anyhow. They will not understand anything about the FDCPA or about the kinds of rights they have under it. And they won't know that they can sue for offenses of the law by debt collectors either. And they won't understand anything about the rights they hold under the law or about any kind of enforcement action they may give vindicate those rights and recuperate damages for them. They are just oblivious about any of this.

For example, because Montana case mentioned above, a financial obligation collection law company filed a suit on an ended claim for a debt. During the course of the suit, it was found that that firm filed countless claims each year in court which 90 percent of those claims ended in default judgments versus the individuals they submitted fit versus. What this indicates is that the person who was sued, the individual who presumably owed the cash, didn't answer the claim and didn't appear in court. And whether the claim versus them was excellent or not, whether it was legal or not, whether the filing or the collection efforts broke the FDCPA or not-none of this would ever be known since the people simply gave and let it go. They let it go and then had to deal with the garnishment of salaries and/or attachment of home.

They all disregarded it, that is, other than for this one guy and some others. This man-these people hired lawyers and submitted a suit for offenses of the FDCPA. And they won. It is very important to know your rights under the FDCPA when a financial obligation collector contacts you. You can not enforce them if you do not understand them."