Minnesota residents have enough issues concerning bills past due without the phone ringing off the hook. Most people would pay their bills if they could. They don’t need someone calling them, insisting on payment and telling them what they owe every day. Many people in this position may not realize that they can stop debt collection calls.
Any Minnesota resident either going through or who has gone through this knows that not answering or hanging up on debt collectors only tends to make them more persistent, which may violate the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act. So, what steps can an individual receiving these calls take in order to make them stop? He or she could simply answer the phone and let the debt collector, and thus the debt collection agency, know that it would be preferable to communicate in writing instead of by phone.
Perhaps the better way would be to send the debt collection agency a letter telling it to cease and desist contact with the individual, which should be sent via certified mail, return receipt requested in order to have evidence that it was sent in case of further contact. The debt collector may contact the sender one more time in order to acknowledge its receipt and indicate whether other collection efforts will, may or will not cease. However, if the original lender is still the one contacting you, this will not work. It only applies to the agencies the lender hires to take over debt collection activities.
The return receipt from the letter is critical in establishing the agency was told to cease communications should it become necessary to pursue legal action for a violation of the FDCPA. If an individual seeking to stop debt collection calls continues to receive calls, emails, texts or letters from a collection agency after it was told not to and after the last allowable communication, it would most likely constitute a violation of the FDCPA. Filing a complaint could result in an award of damages and a deterrent to the company continuing to violate people’s rights.
