Need advice on filing a claim against UCB

My advice is to pay the debt you owe and forget about suing the collector as he is just trying to collect the debt you skipped out on.

IGNORE HIM KMAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! No Nonsense collector just comes in here to flame on people. Someone will be along shortly to give you the best advice.

Yeah well these CA's don't have the right to blatantly break the law either.

you did file a DV and C&D letters,if so then document all calls.check your state laws where it pertains to recording.the more evidence against them the better.

Even though UCB says they are in Toledo, OH, I think they calls are routed to the states from some foreign country. Every collector that has called me is foreign.

I wouldnt sue them in small claims court, to begin with. I would sue them in your state district court. I wouldnt worry about the cost of doing so, as long as you have a well-documented case against them, because in the end you would be asking the court to make the defendant pay your court costs.

Keep this in mind--this is a federal law, and a lot of small claims court judges arent up to speed on collection law because they dont have to be. For example, go take a look sometime at what has been going on in MA small claims courts--debt collectors are suing debtors there, and the courts are making a complete mockery of the laws. For one thing they dont know anything about "validation"....they are ruling in favor of CA's that havent even proven their case. For another, the court itself up there has threatened debtors with jail time--and actually jailed some--if they dont pay, which is completely against the federal law. Dont use small claims for this....

also, the penalty for this is not $1000--it is UP TO $1000, depending on what the court orders. It is entirely poossible that you could get a ruling in your favor, but that the court would assess no monetary penalty against the CA...its happened before.

That is just $1,000 in statutory damages, you can also claim punitive damages.

Also in response to the Michigan case of a person being jailed. That sounds odd to me because small claims are handled by magistrates, which do not have the authority (at least not in my state) to handle criminal cases per se.

I would think punitive damages would be a stretch but I'm sure its happened before. Yeah sounds like district court would be the place to file. I probably won't go through with it, seems like too much of a hassle. Not sure how I would prove something like that either unless I'd actually recorded the call.

No Paul I haven't filed a DV letter yet. I was hoping this would be settled by now. I just received my first notice in the mail last week. I guess my next step will to be a DV letter.

Well, thanks for the replies everyone, hopefully this whole deal will be over shortly

To the comment on Massachusetts, you are dead on. The reason people are losing is cause they don't fight back or don't know the law. I am 2 steps ahead of them the whole way. I have about 70 pages of information to fight my case in small claims and I am very confident in winning against these bottom feeders.