We have discussed at great lengths all the different ways that consumers can say they are disputing a debt without using the word dispute. Sometimes because they don’t know they didn’t say it and sometimes because they are trying to trap the collector into thinking the debt wasn’t disputed when it actually was. A District Court judge in New Jersey has granted a defendant’s motion to dismiss a Fair Debt Collection Practices Act case, ruling the plaintiff never crossed the threshold of actually disputing the debt and therefore could not claim the defendant violated the statute by not reporting the debt as disputed with the credit reporting agencies.
The Background: The plaintiff filed suit, accusing the defendant of violating the FDCPA by not reporting that she had disputed her debt. The plaintiff claimed the defendant violated Section 1692e(8) of the FDCPA and that she suffered reputational and emotional harm.
The Ruling: While the plaintiff failed to actually allege in her complaint that the defendant violated the FDCPA, the substance of her claim hinges on one phone call she had with a representative of the defendant, during which she purportedly challenged the accuracy of the debt in question.
- In filing the motion to dismiss, the defendant attached a transcript of the call in question, “and it makes clear that the plaintiff did not – in any sense of the word – dispute the debt,” wrote Judge Susan D. Wigenton of the District Court for the District of New Jersey. “Rather, Plaintiff merely asked how the debt had been calculated.”
- At the end of the day, there was nothing n the complaint to allege or even suggest that the plaintiff disputed the debt nor were there any facts for Judge Wigenton could infer that the defendant knew or should have known that the debt was being disputed.
