Harrassing Calls- Wrong Number
Complaint
Whitney Pickens
Country: United States
I have a huge complaint. Last year I got a new cell phone and changed my number. Big mistake! I received a guy's old number who apparently owes everyone. No wonder he changed his number. I have spoken with them no less than 20-30 times in the last year. Majority of calls I no longer answer because I'm sick of having my minutes used by these "people". I've explained to them the situation- being a female and who they are looking for is male, you'd think they'd believe me after we've spoken so many times. They promised to put "x's in front of my number to mess up the already programmed call system" but nothing has been done. PLEASE HELP!!!!! Thank you!
Comments
TCPA only allows autodialed calls to cell phones if previously authorized by the consumer. Most debt collection call center calls are autodialed. Although the prior cell number owner may or may not have provided the number to a creditor, once you tell a caller to cease calling your number (and in particular that you aren't the party they think they are calling), you may have a cause of action under both FDCPA and TCPA.
The statutory penalties for TCPA violations start at $500 per call, and $1500 per call if willfull, so they add up faster than the FDCPA up to $1000 plus damages statutory penalty. TCPA also allows courts to award attorney fees, which makes it attractive to attorneys.
One of the first TCPA/debt collector cases was Watson v. NCO, where the consumer had been harassed by over 200 calls, even though he had notified the debt collector numerous times. A federal judge found that NCO was subject to TCPA, despite the defense by NCO that they weren't covered since they weren't telemarketers.
Other TCPA lawsuits have since been filed against large debt collectors, notably against PRA. Shortly thereafter, PRA started posting messages on all the complaint forums on how to contact them to resolve problems.
Recently, FTC has also assessed large fines for harassing calls to consumers, most notably a $1.7 Million settlement with Allied Interstate.
If you want to recover use of your phone number, you might want to run this by a consumer attorney. You might try www.naca.net to find one in your state.