Debt Collectors Lay Traps

By Author: Victor
Total Articles: 7
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Credit Cards play a vital role in uncontrollable expenditure. Using plastic money is a matter of convenience. But credit cards entail repayment burden which sometimes gets out of hand due to unforeseen circumstances. Big debts build up and you may fall back on payments. Often such situations attract menacing calls from creditors or debt collectors.

Debt collectors are third party collection agents either retained by the original creditors or have bought a delinquent debt form the original creditors. These debt collectors try to collect payment from you using all and sundry tactics.

Third party debt collectors are governed by the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) enforced by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to ascertain fair debt collection practices.

* Debt collectors often try to use the following tactics to trap you:
* Call your family and friends to find information about you
* Harass your family and friends about you
* Try to get information about you from your kids specially if they are young
* Call you at work place and inform your superiors about your debt
* ...
... Call you repeatedly on your phones and demand payment
* Try to extract your signature on debt papers by coaxing you with nice words
* Lie to you and your family members about their identity
* Get as many details about you as possible and use them to harass you
* Use guilt traps to make you feel guilty about your debts
* Make you get tired with their mean methods and thereby you commit payments

Debt collectors play with your emotions to trap you. Calls to your employer or your neighbor will mean an intrusion to your privacy which you definitely will not like. This is one of the reasons why debt collectors call people you would not want to, to make you commit payment quickly. It is also possible that some debt collectors stoop another level down by reaching your kids at school posing to be good Samaritans. Your children should be taught to stay away from these tactics.

Another popular technique used by debt collectors is posing as organizations that owe you money. Unexpected money is welcome when you are going through financial troubles. They call to ask for your bank details or other personal details saying you have won money and they need to credit that money into your account. However, if you accept this story you will enter a difficult trap.

Debt collectors also pose to be people from medical centers/hospitals and try to extract information from you or your family members. They may get your phone numbers from hospitals on some pretext and trap you with that information.

To avoid debt collectors' traps it is best to be wary of the various methods they practice. If in spite of all the measures you take, you do get trapped by debt collectors, you should contact an FDCPA attorney and proceed legally.