all those schoolyards later, they still just want your lunch money

[the_siobhan]

So I have been getting calls from this collection agency lately. As collection calls go, they are actually pretty good - the guy on the phone is professional and courteous, we discuss the issue of my "account" with them and then we go our seperate ways. It's certainly not the first time I've had a collection agency asking me for money, I rather strongly suspect it won't be the last.

They are calling me on behalf of a company called Echelon General Insurance. Nothing unusual about that, right? Except for the minor detail that I've never even heard of Echelon General Insurance, and I have no idea why they think I owe them money.

So every time the guy from the collection agency calls, we go over the same info, (to wit, they claim I owe them money, I claim I have no idea why) he promises to ask them yet again for more details about this supposed debt, and then I don't hear from him for another couple of weeks until my account comes up in rotation again.

Well, today I got a notice in the mail. I have five days to pay.

So I call them up and leave a message, and then just for good measure I find Echelon's number on the web, and call up their billing department and leave them a message. The letter claims I have five days to pay or I'll be getting a summons in big capitalized nouns.

So. Anybody know a good lawyer?

Comments

[greylock.livejournal.com]

I'm just a simple person,
but don't they have to tell you what the debt is for?

Interestingly a similar (albeit different set of circumstances) happened to a workmate last week. She pulled out a Vunderbar Buying Card that had sat unused for four years, which had no annual fee and which she had zero-balanced four years ago. And, you know, I recall her doing it.

Well, as it turned out she hadn't zero-balanced it, they'd given her the wrong figure (so they claim), and the interest had accumulated over four years to generate a $132 debt. They'd lost track of her (despite having her work details) and the associated credit rating problems had emerged.

I suspect your problem us a mix of incompetance, debt buy-out and the like. Or, it could be extortion. Most people would freak out if contacted by a debt collector. I know I would.

[the-siobhan.livejournal.com]

I suspect your problem us a mix of incompetance, debt buy-out and the like.

Quite possibly. But the only thing I can think of that might have generated such a debt happened recently enough ago that they would have had my current contact info. These guys have been trying to get ahold of me at my old house.

Or, it could be extortion. Most people would freak out if contacted by a debt collector. I know I would.

Heh. Dude, I've been broke all my life. I'm used to it.

[snickerpuss.livejournal.com]

"Heh. Dude, I've been broke all my life. I'm used to it."

Ha! I hear that, oh my sister. *high-five*