Help with illegal loan + apparently legal collector

This morning I received a phone call from a collection company called National Recovery Service / NRS. The phone number provided in the message left for me and on my Caller ID was 888-622-0222. It would appear that the company is legitimate, albeit the first half dozen to dozen search results on the contact information seem to indicate they are a pushy debt collector.

The message that was left was from a woman named Jessica. She claimed that she had some paperwork that came into their office that I might not be aware of. She wanted me to return the call (to the number above) and discuss the matter further. I use a Google Voice number to mask my Caller ID when I want to place a call and not reveal my true identity, so I first dialed into that number and then called the toll-free number provided. At least initially, I felt like something was up. The first responder didn???t identify her company until questioned. After verifying the name of the company I ended the call.

About an hour later I found a few minutes to call them from another Google Voice line. I spoke with another rep that clearly identified her company???s name and provided her name as well when she answered. After verifying my info I was informed that the account they were collecting against was an outstanding (?) payday loan from 2007. The client company was called Cash Transfer Center, or CTC. Based on a search on DCC I determined that this is an overseas based online payday lender. I plugged both Cash Transfer Center and CTC into my state???s licensee database and determined that at least currently, CTC is not a licensed lender in the state of Illinois. It???s kind of hard for me to determine if the lender was ever licensed in my state at this point, though.

So here I have a loan, allegedly disbursed from 2007, that is now in what appears to be a legitimate collector???s office. I checked out the collector, they aren???t accredited by the BBB but they have a ???B-??? rating. No legal threats had been made by the collector and I was advised by the rep I spoke to that no negative credit reporting had been made and I was only on Teletrack ??? a subprime credit reporting service.

I???m familiar enough to know that this collector should have already sent me, by now, a notice by mail that they had a debt in their office for collection. They???ve had the account in their system since Feb ???10, and thus far have only conversed with me via e-mail. The account they provided isn???t mine. However, they have a previous address of mine and my social security number Also, the number I was reached at this morning was an unlisted telephone number on Vonage. The caller was concerned that I wasn???t aware of the debt ??? and not a faux sense of concern but rather along the lines of ???uh oh, it???s happening again??? type of scenario. I mentioned to the caller I???ve been getting a lot of scam calls from people with thick, Pakistani accents claiming I owe on old payday loans from years ago. I have a credit freeze on my account now and for the record I???ve had no prior dealing with her company up until this morning. She seemed to be in agreement with all the facts I had stated.

Has anyone had experience with NRS collecting on payday loans that (at least seem to be) illegal? Again, no legal action was advised, acknowledged or threatened. At this point they only seemed ???concerned??? I wasn???t aware of the account.