San Diego Creditor Harassment Attorneys

Before filing bankruptcy, people are often harassed by creditors.  Endless collection calls, texts, emails and letters hounding you to pay debt you cannot afford leads to stress and anxiety.  The Law Offices of Mark L. Miller we stop creditors from contacting you and get you on a path to financial freedom.

While creditors and debt collectors are allowed to contact you about your past due bills, there are laws in place to protect you from harassing debt collection.  Federal and state law limit how and when you can be contacted about past due bills.

In addition to filing chapter 7 or chapter 13 bankruptcy, you might have a case for violation of the RFDCPA.  For this reason, you need an experienced bankruptcy attorney who knows how to handle creditors.

State and Federal Law Prevents Creditor Harassment

Occasionally creditors use harassment to get people to pay debt.  For that reason the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and the California Fair Debt Collection Practices Act were created.

The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act ("FDCPA") is a Federal law created by Congress to prevent illegal debt collection practices.  The FDCPA applies only to third party debt collectors.  Only if a third party is harassing will you be protected under the FDCPA.  Similarly, Congress limited application of the FDCPA to personal debts.  Business debt is not covered.  Companies often sell charged off collect accounts to third party companies.  Some debt collection companies collect for the creditor.  The debt collection companies that violate the FDCPA or RFDCPA may be liable by the government for violations and may be subject to lawsuits.

Equally important is the California Fair Debt Collect Practices Act ("RFDCPA").  Unlike the FDCPA, the California law protects consumers from deceptive, abusive, or unfair debt collection by creditors and debt collectors.

For example the Federal Trade Commission files cases against debt collectors for FDCPA violations.  For over 25 years our attorneys have been suing creditors for breaking the law before, during and after filing bankruptcy.

Specifically, collection companies cannot do any of the following:

• Call you prior to 8:00 am without your prior permission.
• Call you after 9:00 pm without your prior permission.
• Contact you after you are represented by an attorney.
• Contact your friends or family members without your permission.
• Threaten to harm you
• Threaten physical violence
• Contacting you at work without your permission.
• Lie to you.
• Use abusive language.
• Impersonating a government official,
• Impersonate a police officer.
• Threaten to send you to jail.
• Threaten to harm your reputation, property, person, or family.

Our bankruptcy attorneys will give you a free evaluation of your financial situation and how to deal with your creditors.