Privacy Matters: Hot On the Trail of Ms. Gloria A—!

When my husband and I settled in the small community where we now live, we got new phone numbers. This was the year 1999, and cell phone usage was not as ubiquitous; most people still had landlines. We each got separate lines because my husband uses the phone much more than I do, and experience had already shown that I would end up being a de facto secretary.

I had already experienced many phone calls such as this: “Do you know where he is? I need to speak to him right now about…” Most of the time, I could not help such callers. Things improved a bit after he got a cell phone; at least I was able to call him to let him know someone needed to speak to him right now.

So, now that we were married and settled into our new home, we each had (and still have) our separate lines. We also have cell phones.

When we got our land lines, little did we know that my husband had actually signed up to be harassed by phone, daily.

The quarry is actually not my husband, but one Gloria A—, and her overdue account is quite old, being as, apparently, she had my husband’s number before my husband did.

The calls started coming in almost immediately. Messages were left on the answering machine. Call immediately to clear up this complaint!

My husband dutifully called the number. He explained to the person who answered the phone that he was the new owner of this phone number, was obviously not Gloria A—, and please stop calling.

The man on the other end of the line asked, “Do you know Gloria A—?”

“No,” my husband patiently answered, “we just moved here.”

The man then got surly, “Well, we have found that people who say they don’t know the people we are looking for really do know them.”

“This number may have been hers before, but we moved to this house and the phone company gave me this number; it is mine now.” My husband tried to reason.

The man persisted, “Can you tell me how to get in touch with Gloria A—?”

“Look,” my husband said, “I am telling you that I do not know Gloria A— and you don’t believe me. If I were to now suddenly say I know Gloria A—, would you believe me, then? This is my new phone number, and I have nothing to do with this. Please stop calling.”

And so it is that the calls have been coming regularly, between 9am and 10am, every morning. My husband tried several times to get this to stop, to no avail. So, we screen the calls and let the answering machine collect the useless messages.

Although the calls originally may have come from one company, they are now coming from another company. I’ll tell you the name of this company because they are quite notorious, and they will probably think of it as publicity: Debt Recovery Solutions. This company specializes in what are known as “zombie debts,” that is debts that have gone uncollected from other debt collection agencies. These other agencies have given up but, believe it or not, they sell these uncollectable accounts, rather like the old junk bonds the banks used to sell, to much more sleazy operations down the debt collection food chain.

Most often, “zombie debts” are old phone accounts, or book and music club accounts that went delinquent ages ago. And I mean, these debts are really old, quite often more than 8 years old. Many times, these are not even legitimate claims—the debt had either actually been paid and not properly posted, or was subsequently cleared, but the debt file still exists because it was sold to this other operation, having never been properly cleared up. These accounts are all beyond the statute of limitations.

Debt Recovery Solutions leaves at least one message on my husband’s answering machine, every day.  We have received messages from actual people, telling us to call a toll free 877 number. Sometimes, however, the message is a prerecorded one, saying “Hello, this call is about a debt collection. We need you to return this call immediately. If you are—” and here there is an abrupt cut in by different mechanical voice, “Gloria A—” which then cuts back to the original mechanical voice, “please press 1 now. If you are not,” cuts again, “Gloria A—” cut, “please press 2 now and stay on the line.”

Really?! If you were Gloria A—, would you accept such an invitation? And if you are not Gloria A—, but somehow foolish enough to press 2 and stay on the line, I wonder what will happen? I suspect you will just be signing yourself up to continue to be harangued by some abusive nitwit for years, because you obviously are in cahoots with Gloria A—. What I know for certain is that pressing 2 and staying on the line will not be a way to get them to stop calling you.

And, so the calls and messages have continued, even unto the present day.

At a certain point, the National Do Not Call Registry came into being (in 2004, after a court challenge), and we registered our numbers right away, thinking this might solve the problem. Unfortunately, this does not solve the problem. Collection agencies and Charities are still allowed to call any number they want. And I think that carpet cleaning companies are also somehow allowed, although they shouldn’t be; perhaps they are illegally registered as charities. But it doesn’t matter; the unwanted calls continue.

Debt Recovery Solutions is the end of the line for zombie debts, I suspect. They have managed to bully many people into paying them money that should not be paid to them. The hapless victims think this will get these bottom feeders off their backs. Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth, as you can see by doing a simple search on the web. Debt Recovery Solutions is a prize bully. Known for putting dings on credit ratings, this company cannot be reached with certified cease and desist letters, and you cannot fight them through the legal system, apparently.

Legally, you are entitled to at least $1000.00 if a case goes to court and you are innocent. But guess what? You will have to hire a lawyer, and guess what, there are tons of bottom feeding attorneys out there who specialize in this kind of litigation. (Perhaps these attorneys are actually clandestine employees of the debt collection agencies, themselves, and this whole racket is a system that is self-perpetuating.) And I have read, among the many consumer complaints I found online, that even if you can contact the company, bring them to court and prove your case, the dings stay on your credit record, are not removed. Somehow, the company cannot be compelled to clear things up. Seven years of bad credit luck ensues.

Where does this leave us, with regard to truth, justice and matters of privacy? The only conclusion one can come to is that There Is No Such Thing As Privacy and your life is irrevocably open to such unwanted intrusions. Companies like this are an untraceable menace, seeming to exist beyond the arms of a legal system that really doesn’t care to bother with protecting consumers from phone harassment.

My husband and I consider, from time to time, giving up the phone number. He mostly uses his smart phone now. We do get many calls on this landline, from people who have known us for a long time, from family, friends and neighbors. We have never met Gloria A—; as far as we know, she does not live in our community.

I think the reason we have kept this phone number, despite the continuing aggravation, is because we feel somehow protective of Gloria A—. This all might be over the last bill she was sent for the number that is now my husband’s. If she moved without a forwarding address, that bill would have gone into limbo. All of this bother could just be for a partial month’s phone bill from 1998.

The messages are left daily. We delete them from the answering machine.

After more than 15 years, they are still hot on your trail, Gloria A—! Watch out!

Caveat Donator: Pars Secundo

I previously wrote about an incident where my husband and I received a lien notice. in October of 2013, against an auto we had donated and had not seen since the previous February.

Here is the location of the original entry:
http://songsofasouljourney.blogspot.com/2013_10_26_archive.html

In the meanwhile, I am putting the takeaways here, right at the top. That way, if you don’t have time, or otherwise don’t want to read this story, you can go away having been completely and utterly informed by this article. Don't worry if these takeaways seem unrelated; you'll thank me for this information later.

The TAKEAWAYS:

#1 - DO NOT DONATE CARS! If you want a group to benefit by a gift from you, sell the old clunker you have for parts, file all the paperwork yourself, and hand the group a check. Read farther down if you want find out why this is better.

#2 - Transparency means that everything organizations and institutions don't want you to see is farmed out to a contractor, where the opaque becomes more opaque; no one you need to talk to is reachable by phone; you can’t get a report in under 4 weeks, though the data is all digitized; and no one is accountable to the truth but you.

**

As I mentioned in that previous article, I sent $20.00 to the DMV to get the history of the car, so I could prove I no longer was responsible for it. This was indeed the best $20.00 ever spent. I received the documents in November; they proved we no longer owned the car. I collected these, along with everything else I had relating to this odd incident, into a file. I had already returned the lien notice to the DMV indicating I had no interest in the vehicle and was not the owner of it. I waited for the other steel-toed boot to drop.

Last Thursday, we received a call from a collection agency. Clunk. That was the other boot.

The collection agency was calling to tell us our credit rating was at risk if we didn’t pay a bill for towing and storage of the vehicle we no longer owned. I explained we had a release of liability and that we never saw the vehicle once it was towed away from our home, and further, we had never received a bill from anyone and expected to pay nothing.

I faxed documents over to the agency and the woman called back to say that their legal advisor would look it all over and call me to let me know what the resolution was.

Tuesday morning, after a holiday weekend, the call came. The documents I provided were insufficient, I was told—we would still be obliged to pay. I reiterated that I had never seen a bill from anyone, and had no idea how much money was involved. We are not legally obligated in the matter of this car, I yelled into the phone; this is a matter of public record! I asked the woman to fax me all the information pertinent to their case. (They are actually required to do so, by law.)

The more I thought about this, the madder I got. How in the world did this happen? I called the donation center that handled the car and left an urgent message, asking for a return call. I emailed Consumer Action with my story, asking for advice.

Then, I started doing research on the web. What was up with this collection agency?

Well, what was up is that they have an “F” rating from the Better Business Bureau. The complaints I found on Yelp resonated with what I was experiencing. Interestingly, this company had been named in a class action suit against a consumer credit reporting agency that allegedly disclosed consumer credit scores to that collection agency and possibly others, in clear violation of the Fair Credit Reporting Act, so that consumers could be targeted based on their financial vulnerability. Lovely. The collection agency settled with plaintiffs out of court. Well, you know what that means…

(Sigh)

Knowing there was no reason for me to be charged for the towing and storage of someone else’s wrecked car, it was time for me to play hardball back. I drafted a very terse note to the general manager of this agency:

  

We have been receiving phone calls from your collection agency regarding an automobile (VIN # -------) that we have not held title to since February 5, 2013. This is a matter of public record through the Department of Motor Vehicles, to which you may apply for verification.

We find it curious that we are receiving phone calls from a collection agency when we have never received an invoice or a collection notice. We can only conclude that you are making a fraudulent claim against us on behalf of your client.

If your office persists in harassing us in a matter that does not concern us, or if our credit rating suffers at your hands, we will take legal action. In the meantime, we shall be contacting the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the FTC regarding your activities.

Sincerely...

I sent this missive by certified mail on Thursday, January 23rd.

Friday came and went. Nothing was faxed to me by the collection agency.

The Consumer Action people got back to me with advice, and the donation center spoke to my husband, who forwarded all the documents pertinent to them.

Saturday, we received a bill from the collection agency, our first contact by mail. The amount they want is nearly $3,000.00. This bill was dated January 13, 2013, but was obviously sent overnight, possibly retro-dated, to cover for the fact that they had forgotten to send us a bill. Most things sent from that ZIP Code to ours come overnight or in two days. The reason they had to send this is that, by law, they are not supposed to communicate with us by phone until we have received something in the mail in writing from them. The postmark on the envelope is January 24^th.

HA!

We are surrounded by technology, and everyone and their brother seems to have access to my information, yet that is somehow insufficient to prove something as simple as “we haven’t owned the car since February that was involved in an auto accident the following October”. We still have to push the paper around. Even though we have pushed paper at them, they persist in their quest.

Okay, the way we read it is that the bottom feeding collection agency is in collusion with the towing company to work one kind of fraud. But we realized there is probably another kind of fraud going on here, and it has to do with the auctioning of vehicles.

When we organized the documents from the DMV in the order in which each event took place, we realized that after the car was auctioned in late February, to the person or company whose address is in Mexico, there was no more paper trail. This is significant, and I will tell you why: if the car was purchased by a Mexican concern, one would assume it was taken to Mexico, particularly as there was no further registration of the vehicle.

However, the car was being driven by California resident in October. Where did that person get the car? And why didn’t the seller properly release liability and transfer title?

Such an occurrence cannot be an isolated one. If it happened with the car we auctioned, the potential is great that many vehicles purchased at auction are being resold without transfer of title.

The implications are chilling. How many people have purchased autos that subsequently disappear from the system? How many similarly unregistered vehicles are on the road, even as we speak, with drivers who are uninsured, possibly even unlicensed? Such “ghost” vehicles not only endanger us if they are involved in accidents, but these cars could be also used in the commission of crime. These vehicles, subsequently abandoned, are virtually untraceable to any person but the last person who registered the vehicle before it was sold.

Fortunately, in our case, no one was injured in the accident involving the car.

We are not done with this story, Morning Glory. We don’t know what will happen next, although we are hoping the case will be closed. Will we have to go to court? Stay tuned...

In the meanwhile, here are those takeaway messages, one more time:

**

#1 - DO NOT DONATE CARS!

#2 - No one is accountable to the truth but YOU.