Statistically, the most prevalent reason consumers give for filing bankruptcy over the last twenty years is creditor harassment. The research on this issue is simple: The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act sets for the guidelines for collectors to operate in their effort to collect debt from consumers. When collectors hound a consumer, that collector's activities may be illegal. The Fair Debt Collection Protection Act (FDCPA) protects consumers from creditor harassment or collector harassment.
The most common forms of harassment are use threats of any kind against a consumer, their family or their possessions; use of obscene, abuse or profane language; repeatedly calling to the point of annoyance; contacting people at work, if the employer disapproves. There are many more actions that qualify as harassment under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA).
Unfortunately there is no collector harassment police force and we found it is difficult finding attorneys to take cases against collectors on a contingency basis (fee based on recovery - like personal injury cases) because the FDCPA limits recovery against collectors. Consumers can report abuses to regulatory agencies, but the response time can apparently be lengthy and sometimes, no action is taken until consumer complaints become overwhelming.
These leaves consumers to take action on their own. The good new is that from what we found, it is easy for a consumer to protect against harassment, and to take action to stop harassment if it has occurred. It is even fairly easy for a consumer to demand damages from collectors for violations of the FDCPA.
