The Gideonse Bible   With the beard? Yeah, you!

Speaking of greed and capitalism and pure evil hiding behind the “free market,” the Times did a bizarrely kind story on how debt collectors are going after the living relatives of deceased debtors — even though those living relatives do not have any legal responsibility to pay back said debts. And if you believe the guy who claims he tells the relatives the law, I have a bridge to sell you. Or some Bank of America stock:

Scott Weltman of Weltman, Weinberg & Reis, a Cleveland law firm that performs deceased collections, says that if family members ask, “we definitely tell them” they have no legal obligation to pay. “But is it disclosed upfront — ‘Mr. Smith, you definitely don’t owe the money’? It’s not that blunt.”

Just so you know, “not that blunt” is code for “We lie.” Debt collection, as an industry, has figured out that threats, lies, and lawsuits are the quickest way to get money from poor people.

You’re out of work? They don’t care. You have a terminal illness? They don’t care. The credit card company gave you a $12,000 limit and your income was, ha, $12,000 a year? It’s your fault that you used the card. They don’t care. The debt was already written off by the lending institution as a tax deduction and the rights to the debt were purchased by a bottom-feeding collection agency for pennies on the dollar? They don’t care. And you still have to pay them. Or they’ll sue and take your house, your car, your TV set, your credit rating, and then they’ll garnish your wages. They don’t care.

And even after you pay them, they’ll still sue you. Just to be sure. After I paid off my Fleet credit card, three separate collection agencies went after me. Each time, I faxed them the letter from Fleet that stated I had paid off the debt. Then in 2006, a collection agency in San Diego — after I faxed them and wrote them and told them that the debt was paid — sued me. The company, Patenaude & Felix, responded to my WTF?! phone calls with, “We emailed the bank and they claim that you still owe the debt.” After making three or four phone calls to Bank of America, which had bought Fleet, in search of the person who had signed the letter, I found someone who was appalled that I was being sued. She called the legal department at B of A, which had supposedly told Patenaude & Felix that I still owed the debt, and she got the lawsuit killed. In about five minutes. When I told Patenaude & Felix, they were shocked. Shocked.

So, I sued Patenaude & Felix. And it was settled. The confidentiality clause says that I’m not allowed to say how much. But it doesn’t prevent me for saying anything else. They refused to admit any wrong-doing. My feeling is that any company that would sue someone for a debt that had clearly been settled, ignored all evidence that the debt was settled, and then had the nerve to claim that it wasn’t their fault that they sued me in error… well, wrong-doing is obvious. But, hey, whatever floats your boat. If Patenaude & Felix thinks that the records of my lawsuit won’t make them look bad because they didn’t “admit” they did anything wrong, that’s their own denial problem. I know they are evil. And so does anyone else who has ever dealt with them.

And that, folks, is just another one of the wonders of unchecked capitalism.

UPDATE:

Who is searching for “patenaude & felix gideonse”? Hmmm.