Encore Receivable Management is harassing me. How to stop them?

Before I start really breaking everything down, I want you to understand a few things... There is not a single collector at encore that I know, that enjoys hitting up a 90 year old women, who her husband has passed away and now she can not pay her bill. Notice the words can not and instead of hasn????????t... However, on the flip side as a collector and even now as a manager I LOVE ripping into someone who charged a 3000 dollar balance and are first payment default (never made a payment)

or the people that whine and moan about my life's so bad, I have no money, but yet when we pull up there statements they'd charged at Tommy Hillfigure,

My mom is getting the same type of call on her cell phone. The only difference is there is no number with these calls and as soon as she answers it clicks. She was thinking it was because instead of a regular ring she has a song for her ringtone. It would be nice to figure out who is calling and for what bill though.

Encore Manager, you will have a lot more validity on the forum if you learn how to spell, i.e. Tommy Hilfiger, not Hillfigure. Sorry but people will think you're not trying to be helpful if you don't spell correctly.

Please stay with us and try to help those they are plagued by collections and really truly trying to pay their bills. We welcome collectors who try to help.

Now for your answers

First Mom of Twins & Roxette

The number is 888-447-4169, in their system, the last names and zip codes have been sequentially arranged. I have heard that when they try to collect a debt from a family having the same last name and zip code, if they have left the country, they start contacting the following person without any written correspondence.

False - we do not associate last names with zips, we do contact relatives to collect the debt however we do contact friends/family in attempts to locate the card holder

Before you start payment towards your debt account, you need to know if it is with the creditors or is it sold to the outside collection agency. In your case, whoever is holding the account, they can only be paid and not the other party.

False ???????? we collect for Capone we are a 3rd party however due to Capone????????s size an internal group would be counterproductive they outsource there pre-recovery accounts to third parties and pays us a flat fee each month we do not receive commission off your account. When you set up payments with us you are paying Capone directly we only assist in setting up the check by phone you even write the check out to Capone

If the collection agency is holding the account in valid terms, they will produce the debt validation details before you consider paying them.

False ???????? all disputes need to be done with merchant, general correspondence, and or fraud dept. each number listed on Capone website??????? further more mom of twins??????? More then likely the manager you spoke with was attempting to verify your info to send account to fraud, however with the account being in skip I have the feeling the bill had been paid at one time (not typical of fraud accounts) and the previous number and address associated with the account were no longer valid. In other words you moved and didn????????t update your info, didn????????t get statements, didn????????t make payments.

Tape recording calls???????.
Most states you most announce it at beginning of call or it is not valid its called a Miranda, however it is our company policy for the rep to disconnect the call due to Card holders purposely trying to get representatives to break the law??????? this doesn????????t sound like your scenario it sounds like you taped them for your records???????

Single mom
Encore is now calling me from 888-785-7719. I called back and again the woman just asked for my account# I asked who she was she said encore asked who is encore she said per federal law can't tell me anymore without my name I advised I was not going to give my name until I got more info other than just encore

True ???????? until you verify 6 points of info were not going to tell you any more then that! WHY? To protect the consumers privacy anyone can call from your home phone how would you feel if at thanksgiving your mother saw a missed call on your caller ID got curios/nosey and called us and the first words out of a persons mouth were ???????your accounts in collections you haven????????t made a payment In 112 days and at this point your balance is due in full??????? ???????? personal business I really wouldn????????t want anyone that picked up my phone to have access to

But once you have a zero balance, you can request for it to be closed and they will do so then. Hope I helped. I'm not an expert in the group here, (and God knows that my financial situation is a mess) just trying to help from experience.

Capone will not close your account with balance ???????? false
Capone will close your account at any point in time however we do not have the ability to close the account, and most of the time when people try to its because of the misconceived perception of closing the account stops fees and finance charges???????Not true if it was people could get a credit card rack the bill up to 5000.00 in a few days close the account and look at that they would have just borrowed 5000.00 at 0 % apr and now really without fees would have no motivation to pay back the account rest assured if you have a Capone balance you qualify for all Capone fees including membership.

I just got my very first call ever from Encore. The call was for my wife, and Encore refused to tell me the nature of the call, or the nature of their business, as it was a matter they had to discuss with "my wife" not "me". They've already charmed the pants off me. I can't wait to deal with the next round. Expect more posts and probably questions from me. Thanks for the board.

Without your wife????????s permission we will not speak with you once she has given verbal authority do discuss any and all account information we will be more then glad to discuss the bill with you however we run into situations everyday were spouses request their better half not be contacted nor the debt discussed with them, Because it is not their account

Finally im going to list a few misconceptions out there???????
Calling over and over is not harassment if there is reasonable grounds to believe the card holder can be reached at that number we are only allowed to speak with the CH once each day unless the Card Holder Specifically requests otherwise. However it is not harassment is calling without intent we have the intent to contact the Card holder and to collect on the debt

We contact accounts from 8AM-9PM 7/365 if you can charge on it any day of the year we can call you any day of the year!

Cease and Desist needs to be sent to Capone General Correspondence not to encore if your cease and desist order is not received within 10 days your account will be contacted again by our office

i appoligize about this being posted so late this should be attached with the ealeir post ending with they charged at tommy hilfiger...

brand name clothing stores, bars, clubs, 5 star reasturants, and so on earlier in the week the list goes on and on.

But my personal favorite i didn????????t make a payment because I haven????????t received a statement

once, ok your human.

Twice, you????????re forgetful.

Three times, and all 3 months you've been charging on the account???You????????re avoiding the bill.

I????????ll bet if any one of you didn????????t get your car or mortgage bill for even 1 month the day before it was due you would call and say "guys I didn????????t get my statement, how much do I owe you?"

After 3 years with encore and Capone it is my firm belief that there are 3 kinds of capital one customers. I train my direct reports to probe and exam each account and card holder (as a general rule of thumb) and to associate that Capone card, with that kind of person...

1. Good people, hard times = bal >1000 had account for over a year never late, and all of sudden they stop making payments, most times when they stop something happened someone died, lost their job, got sick ect.

2. Liquidate accounts...First payment defaults, cant make 10 dollar payment each month or even every other usually had account 1-6 months before default and continued to use account while in default

3. The card holder who doesn????????t know how credit works... makes huge payment usually more then 50% of balance every 4 months but will not continue to make a min payments each month. So 4 months later the balance and account are the same size and delinquency because of fees and finance charges, no matter what we tell them and them always end back up in our office.

Generally, Which ever category you fit into is going to determine the aggressiveness of the call.

Encore manager, you remind me of myself as a collector. You have a good idea of right and wrong, and a good conception of irresponsibility and circumstances, and yes, Arlen was embarassing you a bit. Anyhow, since you're on the up and up, you know and go by the laws and communicate intelligently, you're ok here! Unfortunately, your collection agency has a bad rap here with regards to certain fdcpa guidlines. Since you are a manager there, how about you hold a meeting for your staff to refresh them on their FDCPA knowledge. This is good for you, them, the agency, your clients, and your debtors.

Quote:

Geez I just might change banks before to much get's out of hand. I didn't know if I really liked capone or not only dealing with them for a few months, but after all this I may go with my gut instinct. We were banking through a different bank when capone bought them out so we have just been trying to get a feel for whether it would be worth staying or switching our account to another bank. As of today I can not rush to do that because I have pending checks and utility payments to be made but, give me a week and unless anyone has anything nice to say about this bank I will do just that and close out the account entirely.

Phone Calls??????? Capone like most creditors has a predictive phone system i.e. if your account is tagged possible fraud/suspicious activity once you call the customer service phone number and put in your account number the call will be transferred to fraud???????not customer service. We are connected to this phone system if your account is in collections no matter what Capone number you call, when you enter your account number it is transferred to us. Furthermore within Capone and within encore there are multiple departments upon departments you may receive 15 calls a day from encore, however 3 may be from our skip department, 7 may be from our small business department so on and so fourth



Validating debts???????we have the last 6 months of activity on the account. Once you have verified your information if you would like to validate the debt with us or inquire about possible fraud activity please do not get snotty and rude, demanding written validation. However, if you state to a representative I think I might have fraud activity on my account can you go over my charges we will be more then happy to go over the last 6 months of charges and provide you with the amount, date charged, merchant name/location and all other corresponding information we are able to provide. Item by item, statement by statement.

Cease and Desist/written validation

Be weary of this because it is used as a stall tactic, however if you stall and your account is charged off because you did not make payments you will reap the consequences

Consumer credit counseling Services

In my experience most cccs do more damage then good, there are a few out there that can be a useful alternative for a struggling consumer however most are not??????? you end up paying someone else to pay your bills, when you already don????????t have enough money to do so. They stay in business by placing the money you send them each month into a bank account and collect interest. (This is how they stay in business also some cccs will make minimum payments or half minimum payments to stall until your account with them is large enough to settle with that particular creditor) Then after a few months they contact your creditors and settle your bill (for the same settlement offer you would be extended as the consumer) or let the account charge off. Bottom line you pay someone else to pay your bills???????

Accounts ready for Charge off
You are given 210 days from the last payment that brought the account current to make a payment 180 days from the time you miss your first payment on a 1500 dollar account you are given 6 months to make a 45 dollar payment if you do not it will be charged off and considered a recoveries (charge off account)

Finally I ask you consider a few things while contacting us???????
First we work collections, we don????????t typically deal with the kindest people on a day to day basis all day we are cussed at screamed at and hung up on. We also typically deal with a lot of people who do not care??????? which can be very frustrating when you get a hold of someone who owes 3000 dollars but says ???????so what???????, or ???????Well my credits already ruined so I????????m not going to pay??????? I can pay, but I won????????t unless you reverse my CBR???????

We are human, we make mistakes, get frustrated, angry, and defensive. If when you speak with us and you????????re screaming, yelling, stating you????????re to stupid to deal with my call send me to a supervisor, blowing whistles or horns on the phone. You will not motivate that individual to assist you any more then what is necessary. However if you speak to us like a human being it is a nice change of pace from what we typically deal with, and you stand a much better chance of getting your situation resolved in a manner that is less financial stressful for yourself and still acceptable for our client

I hope this information has been helpful and that you do understand we are not out to harass anyone we are simply trying to retain our clients possible losses

Encore manager

we are based on a dialer system which means each rep has a button on their computer which states dial when they click that button the system dialers 3 diffrent phone numbers per rep (average) who ever picks up will be thrown to the first rep to hit dial. keep in mind we may have 20 people dialing at any given time that means there are 60 phone calls going out half my be disconnected numbers, fax machines, or answering machines if we call you and there is no one on the other line we do appoligize however this is caused because of 1 of 2 things 1 all reps are already connected to a phone call, or you may have taken to long to pick up the phone and the dialer has disconnected the call

In reply to the earlier post call us WITH your mom and we will be more then glad to discuss what the calls are about with you after she gives us permission to do so...

i appoligize about that im not sure as far as capone's policy on closing an account while in collections, however i do know they do have the ability to do so where as at encore we cannot unless you pay the balance. however if you account is in good standing then you can close the account at any point in time but if you have a balance on the account you qualify for all capone fee's. i know because i deal with accounts on a day to day biasis which the card holder closed the account and didnt make any payments for 3 months afterwards and there balance is 250 dollars higher then what it was when they closed the account because of 29 dollar past due fees a 49 dollar membership fee which put them over the limit and then two 29 dollar overlimit fees. this is the current policy however due to customer complaints and complaints made by our company ON THE DEBTORS BEHALF! a new fee policy is in the works and will be implemented shortly when the actual date this will happen im not going to disclose however it will be a very significant decrease on the amount of fees your account will qualify for each month

Encore Manager,

I realize you are trying to help people understand what collections is all about within. But, Encore literally harassed us. I have 7 tapes full of recorded conversations of Encore employees harassing, cursing and threatening my husbands job if we didn't pay immediately. In the state I live in, we don't have to tell the other party we are recording. We filed complaints against Encore with several people including Capitol One and they sent a response back apologizing for the actions of Encore and that they would look into the situation. Obviously they never did, because people are still being treating like crap. I'm sorry, but to me, Encore is listed in my top 10 worst collection agencies list.

Encore Manager....In one of your earlier posts you said

"Cease and Desist/written validation

Be weary of this because it is used as a stall tactic, however if you stall and your account is charged off because you did not make payments you will reap the consequences"


Can you please explain what that means? I am confused.

Basically in my opinion, it is Encores way of avoiding validation. Basically you pay them and not ask for validation or they will make your life a living hell. According to Encore they don't have to obide by the cease and desist. THey are a collection agency and they are bound by the laws that are in place to protect us from companies trying to illegally get money from us.

Statistical analysis which believe it or not some of us are able to do, (contrary to popular belief) has shown at least in my department the rate of charge off on different sized capital one accounts with and without cease and desist orders. With a Cease and desist order you are more then 50% more likely to completely ignore or ???????forget??????? about the bill because???????. 1 you never speak with anyone that can actually work something out with you and actually tell you ???????hey, you charge off in 36 days buddy you need to make a payment or your looking at an R 9 Credit rating associated with this account or do you realize at this point you haven????????t made a payment in 174 days! And your 144 days delinquent? ???????2 all information you receive in the mail is already inaccurate because of a 5 to 10 business day delay in the mailing services (Not to mention if your information is lost in the mail)

Balance > $5000.00

W/ Cease& Desist Standard Collections

3 out of 10 accounts C/O 1 out of 10 accounts C/O


Balance > $3000.00

W/ C&D Standard Collections

4 out of 10 accounts C/O 2 out of 10 accounts C/O


Balance < $1000.00

W/C&D Standard Collections

8, yes, 8 out of 10 accounts C/O 4 out of 10 accounts C/O

sorry about that tabs didnt copy
Balance > $5000.00

W/ Cease& Desist Standard Collections

3 out of 10 accounts C/O 1 out of 10 accounts C/O


Balance > $3000.00

W/ C&D Standard Collections

4 out of 10 accounts C/O 2 out of 10 accounts C/O


Balance < $1000.00

W/C&D Standard Collections

8, yes, 8 out of 10 accounts C/O 4 out of 10 accounts C/O

Encore Manager--is that is the answer to my question? Unfortunately, what I take away from your answer is pretty much what Tammy said. Seems you are "if you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshxx" school. Tanks anyway.

Balance > $5000.00

W/ Cease& Desist Vs. Standard Collections

3 out of 10 accounts C/O Vs. 1 out of 10 accounts C/O


Balance > $3000.00

W/ C&D Vs. Standard Collections

4 out of 10 accounts C/O Vs. 2 out of 10 accounts C/O


Balance < $1000.00

W/C&D Vs. Standard Collections

8, yes, 8 out of 10 accounts C/O Vs. 4 out of 10 accounts C/O

I'm not done yet, pump your brakes bud

Tammy we abide by cease and desist laws just as everyone else does however if you do not mail your cease and desist to the correct location of coarse it is not going to be processed furthermore for the second time WE DO NOT VALIDATE THE DEBT??????? all written validation requests need to be sent to capital one????????s general correspondence, and or fraud dept mailing addresses?????????????? all disputes need to be handled with the above mentioned departments and the merchant. Here is the misconception a lot of you have, we did not purchase your account aka we did not buy the paper this happens AFTER the account is charged off We do not validate the debt because it is not our responsibility because the account is not ours and we are only privileged to the information Capone deems necessary for successful collection of the debt which typically is the last 6 months worth of activity on the account, the responsibility falls on Capone think of Encore as an internal group of Capone (stop moaning and groaning im not saying we are customer service I????????m saying that we can get you transferred to customer service after the issue is resolved just as if your account was in fraud once the dispute is settled it is moved back to CS) most of the time unless the account is in the last stages of delinquency if you can get the account under control we can get you back over to Capone customer services and the card still works bottom line???????????????????????????? if you get caught up before you fall 120 days past due on your bill you can use the damn card again!

as far as my earlier post "Be weary of this because it is used as a stall tactic, however if you stall and your account is charged off because you did not make payments you will reap the consequences" if you use this as a stall tactic and use it for to long your account will be charged off. Now, what that boils down to for you i'm not sure, i dont know your account specifics... if we're talking about a 500.00 dollar account, if we're talking about 50,000 dollar account, if you've had the card for 6 months, or six years, but your Possible consequences are a charge off and a R9 credit rating regardless and depending on the size of your account it may be purchased by another collection agency, and or legal action by Capone. They are not just going to sit down and take a 35,000 loss on a credit card especially if you just opened it 8 months ago!

You do not obide by the cease and desist. You are absolutely correct when you state that you do not validate. Encore claims they are exempt from that. The cease and desist letter was sent to Lawarence, Massachusetts, Olathe, Kansas. Although everyone of the collectors who called denied that they were calling from the number the caller ID showed and denied they were calling from the above addresses. Capitol One got our cards back in little pieces. We have no credit cards and will never again. All they are is a piece of plastic that leads to financial ruins.

the calls could be because you were being called by a diffrenent dept. within that particular agency and again we are not a mail/or billing center we really good give a rats ass what you mail us! we dont want your mail! Period!!! expecially if we have to pay money to forward on to the correct location, more and more because of sites like this that are based on he said she said and not facts we get more and more each day and more and more letters, faxes, ect fall through the cracks because plain and simple thats not our job and not what capone pays us to do. Never was, never will be, your cease and desist your diputes and validations all need to be directed to capone until the account charges off and is picked up by another agency. i cannot stress this enough we are not a mailing or billing center and nor do we have the personell or resources to handle the overflow of mail that comes to our address.

Your office can not handle mail, that is fine. However, that does not exempt Encore Receivable from general compliance. If your office is contantly deflecting people's cease and desists, then there is a problem here. As the manager, I hope you are monitoring everything your collectors are saying. Letting things get out of hand will cause you more problems as the manager, than some misdirected mail.

I am really confused by what you are saying Encore Manager. I guess I don't understand the Encore-CapOne relationship. Are you saying that because you are not a collection agency, that is why you don't have to validate anything? What are you if you are not a CA? You are not the "original creditor", you are not a "collection agency". Again I ask, what are you? You are neither so no rules apply? And if you are not a CA, why are you providing "statistics" about collections? What would you care if you are not a CA?

Tammy---I am seeing your whole point the more info Encore Manager gives(or does not give)

Encore is a collection agency which has to go by the laws of the fdcpa. So obviously they think they are above the FDCPA and find no need to validate or go by a cease and desist. All that is going on here is damage control.

You are correct and as a courtsey to capone and its customers we now have 2 clericals who sit by the fax machine all day and enter that information into the system but i've seen the stack of requests of validation, cease and desist and everyweek we send a big box full of mail intended for capone general correspondance but thats 7 days for your letter to get lost, misplaced, thrown away, ect. again no mail please.

i've already answered that question...maybe you need to read the last few pages of posts... once you can inteligently explain what part you do not understand i'll attempt to explain it a diffrent way...

damage control!!!!!!!!!!!!?????????????? WHAT KIND OF DAMAGE CONTROL DO YOU STATE "the more things fall through the cracks"?????? i'm not sure, of your definition of damage control but rest assured, this is honesty and tammy sorry to tell you, it's not our fault...it's yours for not taking the time to find out the right address to mail your requests.....thats damage control. also what ever did happen with your account? did you ever even speak with anyone about it ? what portion of the balance were you disputing?
what was the end result?

You know what actually I apologize it????????s been a long day and it????????s actually 1:30 in the morning here believe it or not I just got off (ah yes the joys of salary)

I think first I will try again to explain the Capone/encore relationship. Capone is too large to have an internal group handle there in house collections. Basically there are to many accounts for them to place calls and ask hey why haven????????t you paid your bill, your such and such days past due, your apr has now increased to this amount, and if you want to stop everything from getting worse you need to make a payment or your balance is due in full. at my location alone we have an average monthly inventory of around 150,000 Capone accounts....now for the confusing part...we did not purchase your account, nor did Capone ever sell there client rights or responsibilities to us...what capital one does is pays us a dollar amount per account we are successfully able to contact in our inventory basically

$---- X number of accounts in monthly inventory.

the misconceived idea of we purchased your account is inaccurate, if you had a balance of 500.00 dollars we did not purchase the account for 300.00 and then try to settle with you for 400.00 nor did we come to an agreement that if we collect 500.00 Capone gets 400.00 and we receive 100.00 no matter what the size of account is whether its 500.00 dollars or 150,000 dollars (you would be surprised how many of these I see in our small buis dept.) its the same flat fee per account.....

To give an example and keep in mind this is just an example, and not accurate. lets say that Capone pays us $1.00 an account that means that if we have an inventory for the month of 100,000 accounts Capone pays us 100,000 dollars which means if we do not get a single payment for Capone in an entire month they still pay us $100,000.00. If we collect 5,000,000.00 dollars Capone still pays us only $100,000.00 basically whether your account is 500.00 or 50,000 it doesn????????t matter if you pay the balance off on both. We're only going to get 1.00 for each account...Now lets say your account charges off... at this point there are 2 routes Capone can go
1. they sell the account to an outside agency AT THAT POINT they turn over all information and at that point your validation/cease&desists need to go to that agency.
2 they take legal action on the account internally

Tammy, I feel we have gotten off on the wrong foot however everything on this forum throws a red flag that you are responisible for the bill and that your just trying to avoid it??????? in earlier posts you stated ???????I????????m not going to call the agency back because there was no one on the line??????? you????????ve stated that the we HAD told you (BACK IN NOVEMBER!!!) the same as I am now send your cease and desist to Capone???????. You????????ve stated you had received statements from Capone telling you your account was past due??????? Never once have you said THIS BILL IS NOT MINE!!! Maybe we can come to some sort of common ground if you can explain your situation to me.

I have never received anything from Capone. Never heard of Capone. My problem is with Encore and the way I was treated. I have no need to send a cease and desist letter, the card is in consolidation and almost paid in full. Encore didn't get my money, the proposal was agreed upon from Capitol One and they are the ones receiving the money. I have never tried to avoid a bill, and never will. I never denied being responsible for the credit card debt.

Also, this is the first I have heard of Capone. My whole dealings was with Encore. From August 2005 thru the early part of this year was really tough on us and we almost lost everything. Not one of the creditors or collection agencies would listen and we were treated very rudely. We have been dealt with the worst of the worst regarding collection agencies. I guess I really didn't give you a fair shake on coming here to the forums and trying to explain what is happening. If you go through the forums, you will see that alot of us have come under attack by certain collectors.

Encore Manager....

This is your answer in response to my question....."i've already answered that question...maybe you need to read the last few pages of posts... once you can inteligently explain what part you do not understand i'll attempt to explain it a diffrent way..."

I am done asking you any questions. Your arrogant remark is typical of a collector.

I was given a phone number for capones recovery dep. yesterday when I called about my account, which was not of course closed out yet since the - balance is only 2 days old. Then when I called the recovery dept. They told me they couldn't talk to me untill my account had been closed out, I just love the run around, and from what it looks like either the collectors trained the ppl at the bank or the bank trained the collectors one. Cause all I see from encore is the same type of run around.

Guest, take it or leave it buddy, I apologized and re-explained your question thoroughly if that????????s not good enough for you that????????s not my problem...

Tammy, correct me if I????????m wrong but I believe reading this forum someone stated your screen name was previously mom of twins? Am I correct? If so...

On page 1, post 5, you stated ???????I have never received a letter from them. They just keep calling and when I answer, no one is there. I'm not going to call them back because I feel that they should at least talk to me when I answer.???????

On page 1, post 7, you stated ???????I received a letter in the mail from Capitol One on wanting to set up payment arrangements on the past due account.???????

On page 1, post 12 you stated ???????Encore the famous collection agency just informed me that they don't validate debt or abide by cease and desist letters that I am to contact Capitol One and issue them the debt validation letter and cease and desist letter.???????

On page 3, Post 3 you stated again ???????We have sent validation letters and cease and desist letters and they have ignored them and stated we had to send them to capitol 1.???????

On Page 3, Post 13, you stated ???????Today was 15 times. They keep stating that these notices have to go to capitol one. Our attorney questioned why does capitol one have to be notified and they stated that the original creditor gets these notices not the collection agency. They are sadly wrong.???????