Bill Collectors Calling at Work

zeusmachine | Jan 26, 2010 |

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Is it legal for bill collectors calling at work to harass me? Bill collectors and collection agencies have been known to harass citizens for years in an effort to resolve unpaid or disputed debts. Lately, however, many bill collectors have begun calling people at their place of work in their attempts to collect. These collection call are, for many, a source of embarrassment and frustration. Who knew that a bill collector could call you at your job?

The fact of the matter is that you do have rights in this situation and there are steps that you can take to make certain that the harassing calls at work stop. One of the things that is unfortunate in a situation like this is the fact that collection agencies feel that they can do no wrong. After all, you are the person who is delinquent in payment, shouldn't they be able to force you to pay by whatever embarrassing means that they find necessary? The answer to this is no.

The United States government has enacted legislation to provide for the rights of individuals in billing or collection disputes. These laws, specifically the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, also known as the FDCPA, were enacted specifically to curtail abuse and harassment from collection agencies. The FDCPA has provisions for when a collection call can be made and places strict limits on who the collector can speak to regarding your account. The problem is that so few consumers are aware of the rights that are spelled out in this legislation. And collection callers take advantage of the ignorance of the general population to try some questionable tactics to complete their collection -- one of the tricks is to call individuals at work with the implicit threat that the work collection calls will continue unless the debt is resolved in short order.

Are collection calls at work legal?

The question of the legality of bill collectors calling at work is somewhat uncertain. The law is not emphatically clear on this point and for this reason collection agencies have been known to push the limit. They know that calling you at work is likely to be a successful tactic due to the extreme embarrassment that will result. And they know that most people will concede the point simply to make the harassing call at work stop for good. But settling a debt quickly and at unfavorable terms is not always in the best interest of the consumer.

Let's look at what the law actually says regarding the legality of calling a persons place of employment in an attempt to collect a debt. There is a provision of the FDCPA that addresses this very issue. The law states in Section 805, regarding calls at work:

"A debt collector may not call the consumer at work if he has reason to know the employer forbids such communication (e.g., if the consumer has so informed the debt collector)."

How do the rules about bill collectors calling work actually allow me to stop these calls?

The law is clear that collection calls at work can be stopped if the consumer clearly informs the collector that such are prohibited at their place of employment. The onus is therefore on you, should a collector call at your workplace, to inform the bill collector that such calls are not allowed at your work environment. If you make this clear to the bill collector, they are legally obligated to stop calling you at work. In fact, you can force the bill collectors to stop calling you entirely (even at home) if you send them a letter informing them that you want all correspondence to be handled through the mail. You can do this by requesting the collection agency's address and mailing such a letter at your earliest convenience.

The law is very clear on this matter. You do not have to put up with harassing calls at work from bill collectors. The important thing is that you take action to assert your rights and protect yourself from these calls. It becomes quite important to learn the skills for dealing with bill collectors in order to be able to deal with debt collectors effectively. At times you may have to deal with a very aggressive bill collector, but if you take the proper steps you should be able to stop bill collectors calling at work, though you might have to get a little aggressive yourself, or get help, in order to make this happen.