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Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Texas)
Distributed by Knight/Ridder Tribune News Service
July 23, 2006 Sunday

Dave Lieber, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas

Jul. 23--On a residential street in Kennedale, neighbors were getting phone
calls asking about other neighbors.

Tiffany Dow was asked about a neighbor's son.

She remembers asking, "Oh, is this an emergency? Because I can run over and
tell them."

"No," came the answer. "We're a credit collection agency. We're trying to
track him down."

"How did you get my number?" Dow asked.

She was told that her name and address were on the Tarrant County tax
appraisal district's Web site and that her number was in the phone book.

"So," Dow remembers replying, "you're calling neighbors to collect your
debt? That's ridiculous. I can't believe you're doing that. Don't ever call
here again." And she hung up.

Dow, who said she couldn't remember the company's name, wrote The Watchdog
and asked if such calls are illegal.

The answer, in this situation, is maybe. Debt collectors can call a
neighbor, identify themselves as a debt collector if asked the name of their
company, and explain that they are trying to find someone, according to
federal and state laws. But they are not allowed to disclose any information
about a debt.

Calls like those in Kennedale now happen more often, industry observers say.
Contributing factors include growing consumer debt, new restrictions on
bankruptcy filings and the booming collection industry, which is growing
almost as fast as the debt.

Tom Kelley, a spokesman for the Texas attorney general's office, said
complaints about overly aggressive debt collectors are increasing.

Another neighbor on Dow's street, Christine Williams, described a call that
may have skirted the legal line.

Williams said she got a call from Ford Motor Credit Co. asking about another
neighbor. According to Williams, the caller said, "We want to know if the
people are still living there, and if they are still driving the truck."

That question about the truck, some experts say, is possibly illegal because
it gives the neighbor too much information.

"I don't think we would go so far as to say, 'Does he drive the white
truck?' " said Louisville, Ky., lawyer Donald Haunz, who works at a law firm
that represents collection companies. "We would say, 'We are trying to
locate Mr. Smith and do you know him? And do you know if he still lives at
blah-blah address?'

"We would try to be as unobtrusive as possible. But we would ask questions
that help us locate him."

A Ford Credit spokeswoman said its debt collectors are supposed to ask
neighbors for accurate contact information. "We would never discuss the
particulars of a certain account with someone we called," Meredith Libbey
said.

Beth Givens, director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse in San Diego, said
that callers cannot tell neighbors that "the dirty rotten scoundrel across
the street is not paying his bill," but that it doesn't take much for a
neighbor to figure out what is going on.

She said consumers seeking legal representation in battles with debt
collectors can visit the Web site for the National Association for Consumer
Advocates ( www.naca.net) to find a lawyer with that specialty.

Doing that, I found Fort Worth lawyer Jerry Jarzombek. He told me that if a
collector has already contacted the debtor and discussed the debt with him
or her, then the collector is not allowed to contact neighbors. That could
be considered harassment, rather than searching for information, he said.

"The key in making that determination is whether they are really looking to
see if the guy really lives there," he said.

"I am someone who has a problem with somebody trying to use abusive tactics
to scare money out of someone," he added.

Last month, he filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Fort Worth on
behalf of a Bedford mother and daughter who, according to the lawsuit, were
illegally threatened by a New York collection agency.

Jarzombek declined to discuss the lawsuit, but according to the court
filing, a debt collector who works for Creditors Interchange on behalf of
Capitol One called a neighbor of the family and stated "that she was working
with the Bedford police to make an arrest within the next hour."

Bedford police Lt. Kirk Roberts told me that police do not get involved in
civil matters such as debt collections. Bedford police also have no records
of any investigation involving the family, he said.

According to the lawsuit, the neighbor went next door, "shaking and crying,"
to relay the message.

The next day, the suit asserts, the debt collector called the family and
threatened to file fraud charges related to their use of a credit card.

According to federal law, it's unlawful to claim that someone who owes a
debt committed a crime or could be arrested.

I called the debt collector named in the lawsuit, but she declined to
comment. I also called Creditors Interchange, and a spokesman said he would
call back but he never did.

Creditors Interchange was ordered by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer
in 2004 to pay $60,000 in civil penalties for "illegal debt collection
practices," according to a Spitzer news release.

The company was also ordered, when dealing with New Yorkers, to cease
violating federal and state laws, to monitor and record collectors' phone
calls and to make sure that senior management reviews all complaints.

When I asked Givens of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse why federal and
state laws don't prohibit calls to neighbors, she answered that industry
lobbyists are powerful in Congress and state legislatures.

"They have a lot of money and a lot of influence," she said. "But they're
not universally beloved."



News researcher Stacy Garcia contributed to this report.

To file a complaint

If you receive calls from debt collectors that you believe could violate
the
law, contact the Federal Trade Commission at 877-FTC-HELP or the Texas
Attorney
General Consumer Helpline at 800-621-0508.

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