Capital Acquisition an Management Company BEWARE!!!!

The BBQ Pit
1

Thought I’d warn you guys in case you didn’t know…

I got a letter from this company:

*This letter is to notify you that your BANK OF AMERICA account which was formerly held by XXXXXXXX has been purchased by Capital Acquisitions and Management Company.

As of the date of this letter, you owe $739.67. Because of interest charges that may vary form day to day, the amount due on the day you pay may be greater. Hence, if yo pay the amount shown above, an adjustment may be necessary after we receive your payment, in which event we will inform you before depositing your payment. For further information, call the undersigned at (888) 791-8305 EX: 0501.

Federal law gives you thirty (30) days after you receive this letter to dispute the validit of the debt or any part of it. If you don’t dispute it within that period, we will assume that is valid. If you do dispute it - by notifying us in writing to that effect - we will, as required by the law, obtain and mail to you proof of the debt. And if within the same period you request in the writing the name and address of your original creditor, we will furnish you with that information too. The law does not require us to wait until the end of 30-day period that begins with your receipt of this letter, the law requires us to suspend our efforts to collect the debt until we mail the requested information to you.

To discuss, call Mr Turner at (888) 791 - 8305 Ex: 0501 between 8:00AM and 8:00PM (CDT) Monday through Friday.

THIS IS AN ATTEMPT TO COLLECT A DEBT AND ANY INFORMATION OBTAINED WILL BE USED FOR THAT PURPOSE THIS IS A COMMUNICATION FROM A DEBT COLLECTOR.*

I thought to myself, “what the da fuck is this bullshit”. I had settled this account over 5 years ago. This was a bill from 1990.

This all sounded rather fishy to me, so I decided to go on the internet and do some checking of my own and guess what…its a big scam and it seems that some unsuspecting people are falling for it. I found this site http://ripoffreport.com/reports/ripoff80233.htm I figure I come out here and warn my fellow Dopers about these guys. Its also a great website to check on other scams as well.

But thats not the only reason why I posted this, I figure wouldn’t it be cool if a whole bunch of us inundate this company with complaints at the same time…like busy up their lines or something teach them a lesson that we are on to them??? Huh?

2

You would not believe the size of the pit in my stomach right now. These guys have been harrassing my woefully disorganized husband for months. I finally cornered him and asked what it was all about and he said he thought he had some old debt, but thought he had paid for it, but maybe not. I couldn’t get a straight answer out of him, so I took care of it.

I just sent these bastards $500.

I am such an idiot. Pardon me while I go cry in the corner. I’m the dumbest Doper ever. :frowning:

3

Deskmonkey, has the check gone through yet? If not go put a stop on it right now!

4

Nope, they cashed it.

I think this is a bannable offense. I should have known better.

5

Deskmonkey,

  1. Contact local law enforcement and file a complaint.

  2. Contact the fraud division of your city attorney.

  3. Contact your state Attorney General.

  4. If you’re in the U.S., contact the Federal Fair Trade Commission. This is very important. These guys are the big guns. The more complaints they get about a particular scam, the more likely they are to take action. Every complaint counts because they figure that every complaint they receive represents many, many actual violations. When you complain to the FTC, you literaly speak for thousands.

  5. Contact Bank of America – they won’t like being part of a scam and will probably take action on their own, especially if they get enough complaints.

  6. Finally, do what levdrakon did – go public. Contact your local newspaper, TV and radio stations. Most have some sort of “consumer watchdog” and this is the kind of thing they love. Help keep others from getting ripped off!

When bad stuff happens to us, it sometimes imposes a moral duty. You are educated and savy enough to make a public stink and help protect others who aren’t as fortunate as you. Five hundred bucks is a lot of money. But money can’t buy the moral satisfaction you’ll get from standing up for the little guy and helping put these people out of business.

6

Thanks, Truth Seeker. To start, I’m trying to track down the original account. I have the account number, but they won’t give me any info, my husband has to talk to them. He needs to find out what his debt was, then find proof that he paid it off. This will be the hard part since he probably paid with a money order and he probably threw away the receipt and has no idea where the oney order actually came from. Did I mention he was the King of Disorganization?

I may not be able to actually do anything if we can’t prove this wasn’t a real debt. But I’ll do what I can. I kind of just want to call the guy at Camco and ask if we just got ripped off, just to try to make him feel jerky (I’m sure it woudn’t work). But I won’t because that’ll probably get us on some other kind of list.

Serves me right for trying to clean up someone else’s mess.

7

You don’t have to prove it was a false claim - they have to prove it was a real one. (Although it might save embarassment if you come up with the proof that it was a false claim before you contact the TV stations). But never just pay a bill collector without making them prove that you really owe the debt.

8

ENugent is correct. But more to the point, ancient debts (like from 1990) are almost certainly uncollectable due the statute of limitations.

This could well be their scam. Dig up a really old debt and then demand payment. Who’s going to have receipts form 14 years ago? A lot of people will assume, like you did, that since they can’t prove they paid, they can’t complain.

That’s absolutely incorrect, especially if this company has already been identified as a scam. Remember, what moves a public agency like the FTC and the state Attorneys General to action isn’t one strong complaint, it’s the volume of complaints. If they get one complaint, they open a file. If they get a dozen complaints they start thinking it’s a public problem rather than a private one.

Get out there and make a stink.

9

don’t mean to sound “holier than thou”, but when a debt has past its statue of limitations or has been cleared. And a bogus company comes along and tries to collect on that old bill. Thats down right stealing!!!