People who owe money to creditors in San Diego have legal rights when dealing with creditors or debt collectors. All too often, debt collection agencies will resort to underhanded tactics when they try to coax a person into making a payment.

The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) regulates the way debt collection agencies can communicate and interact with consumers. The FDCPA establishes a variety of rules that prevent collectors from engaging in abusive or deceptive behavior. When a collector violates the FDCPA, consumers have legal rights that can be enforced.

For example, the FDCPA makes it illegal for a debt collector to threaten any type of action that is either illegal or that the collector does not intend to take. In this context, a debt collector cannot legally make many types of threats. However, debt collection agencies continue to make illegal threats to consumers.

The types of threats that may immediately come to mind for many consumers involve threats of force or violence. However, other types of threats are covered by the FDCPA as well.

Recently, Global Credit and Collection Corporation was called into court when a consumer sued the collection agency for making threats that possibly violated the FDCPA. The consumer alleges that the collection agency initially contacted her in January about a debt she owed to Capital One. According to her lawsuit, the collection agency threatened to sue her if she did not pay off the debt, although the agency did not have the ability to sue her. The lawsuit also alleges that the agency contacted the consumer's mother and falsely told her mother that a legal action was pending against the consumer.

Because of these alleged Fair Debt Collection Practices Act violations, the consumer is seeking an award of damages plus legal costs and attorney's fees.

Sources: Collections & Credit Risk, "New York Collector Sued For Lawsuit Threat," Aug. 5, 2011

17 American Jurisprudence 2d Consumer Protection § 204