Calling saying something happened to her children

She needs to definatly file a complait with the Attorney's Generals office and the Federal Trade Commission. Make sure she saves that message. That is absolutly insane.

File a complaint immediately. That's completely against the fdcpa. Threats or untrue statements about arrest, jail time, or one's family members are completely illegal. :evil:

ok, thats very low, yes it is illegal!

This is a sure shot case of FDCPA violation. Speak with an attorney and take the collection company to the court. The judge will make them pay the damages.

Absolutely. If someone did that to me I would do everything in my power to expose them, sue them or whatever. That is so low. ANyone can have a serious panick attack while calling this number back thinking that something happened to their kids or loved ones.

I dream of cases like that walking through my door. Tell her to save the message so she can take a copy to her lawyer. She should be able to find one who will not charge attorney fees up front.

Your poor mom! What kind of trash would sink to something like that? I would definitely take them to court. As texaslawyer said, he and I'm sure other lawyers as well would love to have a case like yours. I don't think you'll have any trouble getting a lawyer to take the case. Let us know what happens.

Oh how awful..That's a very low blow. Please report this, and please keep us posted on what happens.

I would also file a police report and do not erase that message.

I agree this is a horrible thing to do, to make a mother fear her children have been hurt. Laws are in place to prevent this, and you should indeed file a report.

My boss, who has since retired, used to tell me stories from the 60s and 70s when he first got into the loan business. Back then, the laws weren't so stringent. He said on some occasions when they were looking to repo a car, and the debtor was hiding the car purposely to avoid a repo, they would do sneaky things like this. He said one of his colleagues had tapes with different background noises on them; one such tape had the background noises that a school office might have (secretaries talking on the phone, type-writer, loud-speaker making an announcement, etc.) The colleague would call the debtor, while playing the tape, and pretend he was calling from the school; he would say something to the effect that there was an accident in gym class and the kid was in the nurses office, and they need the parent to come down right away. Meanwhile, a repossessor is waiting at the school for the debtor to show up. When debtor showed up and went inside the school, they would grab the car and take off.