A District Court judge in Illinois has granted a defendant’s motion for summary judgment after it was accused of violating the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act by sending a collection letter that, along with the amount of the debt, included “Accrued Interest: $0.00” and warned of an additional fee should a check be returned because of insufficient funds.
A copy of the ruling in the case of Lemke v. Escallate, LLC, can be accessed by clicking here.
The plaintiff received a collection letter seeking payment on a debt of $1,225. Underneath the itemized list, the letter also said “Accrued Interest: $0.00” and then listed the balance of $1,225. The letter also included the statement: “You may be charged a $20.00 Non-Sufficient Funds [‘NSF’] Fee for any payment that is not honored because sufficient funds are not available in the account on which the payment was drawn.” That portion was closely followed by instructions about how to make a payment with a credit or debit card.
The plaintiff, even though she never contacted the defendant or tried to make a payment, filed suit, alleging the letter violated Sections 1692e, 1692e(2)(a), 1692e(5), and 1692g(a)(1) of the FDCPA by making false, misleading or deceptive statements.
While acknowledging that the Accrued Interest item in the statement may confuse a least sophisticated consumer into thinking that interest may start accruing at a later date and that the NFS language may confuse that same consumer into thinking there was a fee for any declined payment, regardless of how it was made, Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer of the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, granted summary judgment in favor of the defendant because she “failed to provide any extrinsic evidence” “to prove that unsophisticated consumers do in fact find the challenged statements misleading or deceptive.”
