Is this fraud taking two payments instead of one?

Yes it is fraud and if they have a valid collection liscense they can loose it. I would dispute the charges with your bank if you cannot get it resolved with the collection agency. Block the company from doing Debits to your account that will get their attention...Then tell them they can only get money from you by MO since they violated your verbal agreement!

The payments they take out of my checking account each month are actually in the form of a check, instead of a debit. The bank says all they can do is put a stop payment on the check, but nothing keeps the company from submitting the payment again as a different check number.

They should be able to block the company all together...

if the bank blocks the company from withdrawing from my account, I will then need to send them payments in the form of money orders each month? or should I be able to still send them personal checks each month?

They will take your check more than likely....I would just tell them that you have put a block on all ACH debits or paper or echecks that are not your personal checks...That way they cannot get into your account and they will still take your check...Just keep an eye on your account and make sure they dont submit it under a diff business name

according to my bank the payments are not considered fraud because I had previously given the company authorization to withdrawel the funds from my checking account. They also say they can't block the company from withdrawing the money for the same reason. The only way to keep them from withdrawing the money would be to go in to the bank and change my entire account number. So now I'm stuck again unless I change our account numbers and notify all the other company that ebt our account of the new account number.

Oh Shannon - I know just what you are talking about - my bank did the same thing to me to the tune of over 2k in the red. Then they closed the account!

The bank is trying to avoid their legal responsibility. This is a disturbing trend.

Never pay by personal check or by giving a CA permission to automatically take from your account. Taking more than authorized is a common problem when this occurs. Even mailing a personal check is a bad idea because it gives them your routing number and account number. I have seen situations where they then hit the account electronically multiple times.

In my opinion, money order or cashier's check are the best ways to pay because it keeps your banking info private.

yes i see now that I should have never given them my account information, but whats done is done and I don't know what else I can do about it other than what the bank suggests, which is a huge hassle.

I would open a new account with a different bank if you want this to stop.

Thats the problems with banks! My bank let me put my husband on my account and then when he started stealing all the money told me I couldn't take him off without his signature, so I took him up there and got well you have to have a divorce decree, then it was I had to have a death certificate...and of course I couldnt close it because we were both on it...They did that because all in all they got about 5000 worth of NSF fees from me..funny thing is the account got oD 1600 and they finally closed it and guess who they want to pay them??? Not my husband thats for sure!