Looking for a little assistance here....

[anarky]

This is going to sound a little strange, but I'm running into a brick wall of sorts.

Both my brother and my wife's sister are total deadbeats. In the past, both have gone to various check-cashing and finance companies, listed my wife or I as a reference (without getting permission first), and then not paid.

These companies have a very strange policy: They apparently require an applicant to list a reference. However, they don't call the reference. (Yeah, I know, common sense would tell you to call the reference before lending money.) However, if the applicant doesn't make a payment on time, the company calls the applicant at every number they have for them, and then calls the reference and claims they can't contact the person. In other words, they call your friends and family and try to shame you into paying.

Oh, and they always call between 9AM and 11AM. In other words, when people are at work.

My brother did it first, around three years ago. Unfortunately, he did it at five or six places at once. I kept having to answer the phone (because they keep calling back if you don't). I'd wait until they told me that he'd put me down as a reference, then I'd laugh and say, "I didn't know he'd put me down as a reference, and he didn't have my permission to do so. I'd think that you'd contact a reference before giving someone money. Had you called me, I would have said you're an idiot to lend him anything, because he won't pay it back properly. I've never done business with your company, and my number is on the do not call list. If you don't already have his numbers, they are ______ and ______. Do not call me again." It worked, though for two companies, I had to do it twice before they got the message.

After I grilled him about it (which is, I'm sure now, the result they wanted), he told me he had already spoken with each of the companies before they'd called me.

Thankfully, he seems to have learned his lesson. I've not had it happen again, though I'm sure he's still missing payments on everything he has simply because he doesn't feel like paying.

Fast-forward a couple of years. My sister-in-law is as bad a deadbeat as my brother, but at least you can occasionally knock some sense into him. She has this weird sense of entitlement; she thinks anything any of her family members have (credit, clothes, photographs, whatever) should be fair game for her. She once got her mom to finance a car under her name, since her credit sucked, and then skipped town and didn't make payments. (This was long before I met any of them, and apparently they're all hunky-dory now.) And whenever anyone tries to talk sense to her, she just rolls her eyes and says, "Whatever," or something to that effect.

Oh, and her main problem: she's one of those people who has to live way beyond her means. A family of three on one income (hers), which is far from impossible... except they have to live in a huge apartment in the best area of an expensive city, and they have to eat out every night, have to have the best cell phones (even though they're getting shut off every other month for nonpayment). You know the type.

Anyway.... About six months ago, she got a payday loan for something, and put my wife down as a reference, giving her cell phone. And then, obviously, didn't pay. After Mrs Anarky got and ignored three or four messages in the course of two days, she finally answered the phone and told them essentially the same thing I'd told the same company about my brother. Then she calls up her sister. Turns out, her sister had already been called at home and at work, and had actually told them that she didn't have the money but would pay off the loan the following Friday. (Strange as it sounds, she's a deadbeat, but she doesn't lie about being a deadbeat, so we both believe she did talk to them twice.)

So, now to today. Just got a phonecall on the home phone from the same company, regarding her sister, whom they supposedly can't locate. This time, it appears she was listed by my last name (she goes by her maiden name). I'm not sure if that was to get around the fact she'd told them never to call her again or what. Also, it was the home number, which they didn't have previously.

So, what I'm getting at is not a chance to bitch about this. What I'm getting at is this: Several years ago, I worked as a loan officer (I fucking hated it), and I know this is absolutely illegal. There are laws about what you can and can't do when collecting on a debt, and contacting an uninvolved third-party who didn't provide consent to be contacted--actually harassing them, which is what I'd consider multiple phonecalls and messages a day--is strictly taboo.

So these companies are doing something that's more illegal than pulling the tags off mattresses. I'm sure that they figure that most people who know the sorts of folks who will skip out on a $100 loan don't know that it's illegal, and that's why they do it. Not to mention that when all the phone numbers are on the do-not-call list, it's doubly illegal.

Given that there's no way my idiot sister-in-law will stop doing this (she'll probably put down my name next), and that it is really fucking annoying, I want to file a complaint somewhere. I know there are federal and state agencies that regulate the hell out of lending and collections. Oddly enough, I can't seem to find jack shit. I've been looking online for over an hour, and nada.

Anyone know which government agency I should contact, and how to go about doing so? (I know it'll probably be lost in a sea of red tape, but if there's even a chance it'll work, I want to do it.)

[vynsane]

better business bureau? i know they can't do much, but they can take action and contact the parties involved and try to get your situation resolved. i've filed two complaints, one against an online computer retailer (before i started doing business with newegg exclusively) and one against a domain name registrar who was using the snail-mail equivalent of phishing in order to get people to renew their domain names with THEM instead of their original registrar.

nothing may come of it, but who knows? you could permanently make a "no call" list of their own from now on, and possibly even make an "invalid reference" list, effectively stopping them from loaning her the money. if you know where the businesses are located, or you know their telephone number you can look them up at

http://www.bbb.org/

[RoIIo Tomassi]

Here's another topic about anarky's idiot brother.