EDITOR’S NOTE: This article is part of a series that is sponsored by WebRecon. WebRecon identifies serial plaintiffs lurking in your database BEFORE you contact them and expose yourself to a likely lawsuit. Protect your company from as many as one in three new consumer lawsuits by scrubbing your consumers through WebRecon first. Want to learn more? Call (855) WEB-RECON or email admin@webrecon.net today! Thanks to WebRecon for sponsoring this series.
DISCLAIMER: This article is based on a complaint. The defendant has not responded to the complaint to present its side of the case. The claims mentioned are accusations and should be considered as such until and unless proven otherwise.
A collection operation is facing a Fair Debt Collection Practices Act class-action lawsuit for sending 11 different Model Validation Notices on the same day and for allegedly overshadowing the validation period by having different deadlines on the front and back of the notice.
The Background: Starting at the beginning, the plaintiff claims to be a victim of fraud and that his identity was stolen and used to conduct the transactions in question. The plaintiff allegedly informed the original creditor of this, but the creditor sold the debt to a third party, which placed the account with the defendant anyway.
- The plaintiff received 11 different Model Validation Notices — each of them dated December 30, 2023. Each of the notices included the same account number, but did have a different reference number. Each of the notices also attempted to collect a different amount.
- Sending that many notices at once is harassing, according to the plaintiff’s complaint, and whether any of the notices were duplicates.
- The front of each notice indicates that the deadline to dispute all or part of the debt is February 13, 2024. But on the back of each notice is a series of disclosures, one of which says, “Unless you notify this office within thirty (30) days after receiving this notice that you dispute the validity of this debt, or any portion thereof, this office will assume this debt is valid.”
- Thirty days from December 30 is not February 13, the plaintiff notes in his complaint. That conflict creates a problem because that meant the plaintiff did not know which date was correct.
- Because the accounts themselves were allegedly opened fraudulently, the plaintiff believed the collection attempts to be fraudulent and did not want to send any of his information to the defendant.
The Claims: The plaintiff accuses the defendant of violating Sections 1692e, 1692e(10), 1692f, and 1692g of the FDCPA.
- The suit seeks to include anyone else living in New York who received a Model Validation Notice from the defendant that was collecting on behalf of the current creditor to whom the debt was owed that included two different dates to dispute or request verification of the underlying debt.
