The Daily Digest is sponsored by Beam Software. A Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, Beam is a thought leader in portfolio management and collection software. They offer both cloud-based and on-premise solutions to accommodate the entire collection continuum. For more information, please visit www.beamsoftware.com or call (800) 212-2326.
COLLECTION AGENCY WINS JUDGMENT AFTER USING BOTH NAME OF ORIGINAL CREDITOR AND CURRENT CLIENT IN COLLECTION LETTER
- The law firm of Troutman Sanders has linked to a case where a collection agency was granted summary judgment after being accused of misleading the plaintiff in a class-action suit alleging a violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. The issue in the case was an alleged discrepancy over the official business name of the creditor, Comenity Capital Bank and the name of the client, PayPal Credit, both of which were referenced in a collection letter send by the agency, Simm Associates.
GETTING TO KNOW ISAAC GOLDMAN OF VERTICAN TECHNOLOGIES
- Isaac Goldman is a lot like Al Pacino. Just when he thought he was out, he was brought back in. Goldman grew up in the collections business, but never planned on making it his career. The industry is better off because he changed his mind. Goldman, who helped orchestrate the creation of Vertican Technologies in 2014 by helping bring together a number of companies, has an interesting take on what he wishes the industry would change. Read on to learn more about that and why philosophy’s loss is the ARM industry’s gain.
ACA INTERNATIONAL RESPONDS TO ‘MISLEADING’ ACLU REPORT
- ACA International, the trade group representing collection agencies and companies in the ARM industry, has issued a stirring rebuke to a report that the American Civil Liberties Union published last week that claimed collection agencies were using the legal system to create a modern day version of debtor’s prisons. “Put simply,” ACA wrote in its statement, “the ACLU’s harrowing characterization of modern-day debtor’s prisons, while certainly disturbing, does not exist.”
COLLECTIONS MANAGER PLEADS GUILTY IN FAKE DEBT SCHEME
- The collections manager for an operation that fraudulently collected debts from individuals has pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud and is facing up to five years in prison. Ronald Shane Hough, a collections manager for Direct Processing LLC, claimed he and others made false misrepresentations, threatening remarks and comments, and abusive language to coerce individuals to make payments on fake debts they did not owe.
WHERE HAVE ALL THE ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS GONE?
- Jeff Sovern, a law professor at St. John’s University, and one of the authors of the Consumer Law & Policy Blog, has an interesting question: When will the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announce its first enforcement action under acting director Mick Mulvaney?
DEBT COLLECTION INDUSTRY FACES EVOLVING COMPLIANCE REGULATIONS
- In LexisNexis Risk Solutions’ “Ask the Business Experts” series, Linda Straub Jones, director of collections compliance at LexisNexis Risk Solutions, the data and analytics provider, sat down with Rozanne Andersen, vice president and chief compliance officer, Ontario Systems LLC, to discuss how the collections industry has evolved to tackle new compliance regulations, as well as the trends debt collection agencies will have to face in future.
WORTH NOTING: Hope Hicks, the White House communications director, is resigning, one day after testifying before the House Intelligence Committee regarding its probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election … The “brilliant” tactical choice that Hicks made in her resignation … Indiana, New Jersey, and California are the states with the lowest quality of life, according to a new report … Academy Award nominees are getting swag bags with $100,000 worth of stuff in them, including a 12-night vacation in Zanzibar and Tanzania … Why changes in the tax code may lead to an increase in divorces … Wells Fargo is in the spotlight again, this time for how it handled consumer fraud investigations … Facebook is rolling out a job search and application feature … Food stamps do not cover the average meal price in 99% of counties in the U.S. … An interesting question: should non-smokers get more vacation days than smokers? … How much time you can expect your employees to spend watching March Madness games while at work … Already experiencing a chicken shortage, KFC is now running out of gravy.
A review of Tesla’s Model 3
How fight scenes look from behind the camera
The Daily Digest is sponsored by Beam Software. A Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, Beam is a thought leader in portfolio management and collection software. They offer both cloud-based and on-premise solutions to accommodate the entire collection continuum. For more information, please visit www.beamsoftware.com or call (800) 212-2326.
