Plaintiffs John Slomanski and Margaret Brusewitz brought an FDCPA class action, Slomanski and Brusewitz v. Alliance Collection Agencies, in the Eastern District of Wisconsin alleging that debt collection letters sent to them and other class members were misleading and violated §1692e of the FDCPA. They alleged that the letters were misleading because they listed
In Gould v. Monarch Recovery Mgmt., No. 18-C-1282 (E.D. Wis. Nov. 10, 2020), the Plaintiff’s counsel sought $57,073.37 in attorneys’ fees after accepting an offer of judgment as to claims under the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (“FDCPA”). Finding that counsel had achieved only limited success, the Court reduced the fees requested by fifty
Midwest Recovery Systems (“Midwest Recovery”), a debt collection company, must cease its alleged debt-parking practices, delete all reported debts, and surrender its remaining assets in partial payment of a $24.3 million monetary judgment, under a stipulated order filed by the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) last week. Debt parking, also known as “passive debt collection,” occurs
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, deciding to take up the issue of Plaintiff’s standing sua sponte, recently remanded the case of Adams v. Skagit Bonded Collectors, LLC d/b/a SB&C Ltd. back to the District Court with instructions to dismiss the case without prejudice for lack of jurisdiction. This case involved an FDCPA complaint
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held in Urbina v. National Business Factors Inc. that a debt collector cannot use a “bona fide error” defense to shield itself from liability under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”) by merely: (1) requiring its creditor clients to provide accurate account information, and (2) requesting verification
In Paul v. Enhanced Recovery Company, the plaintiff received two letters from a debt collector concerning the same debt, about 40 days apart. The letters were identical, except for the dates and the amount of the settlement offers – the first contained an offer of $1,375.42, while the second offer was $1,277.17.
In addition
Reversing a district court’s dismissal for failure to state a claim under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”), the Second Circuit (“the Court”) ruled in Mizrachi v. Wilson, Elser, Moskowitz, Edelman & Dicker LP that a threat of suit without further notice included in the defendant’s debt collection letter may have overshadowed notice of
Following a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) investigation into its credit reporting procedures, telecommunications debt collector Afni, Inc. agreed Thursday to implement additional safeguards against inaccurate reporting and pay a $500,000 civil penalty.
The CFPB’s investigation found that Afni had violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act (“FCRA”) in several ways. First, Afni had negligently furnished
New York Attorney General Letitia James and Governor Andrew Cuomo announced on November 4, 2020, that the State will continue the suspension of its debt collection efforts of medical and student debt through the remainder of the calendar year. The suspension, which was originally instituted during March 2020 as part of the state’s response to
Two collection agencies agreed to new disclosure requirements when attempting to collect on time-barred debts, in a settlement agreement preliminarily approved by a United States district court judge in Texas last month. The settlement, arising out of a Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”) class action involving efforts to collect unpaid medical debts, shows concerns