Daily Digest – April 3. Appeals Court Rules on How & When Collectors Must Reveal Debt Totals; Call From Collector Leads Woman To Shoot at Family

The Daily Digest is sponsored by TCN, a leading provider of cloud-based call center technology for enterprises, contact centers, BPOs, and collection agencies worldwide. 

APPEALS COURT RULES ON HOW & WHEN COLLECTORS MUST REVEAL DEBT TOTALS

• The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has ruled in favor of the plaintiff in a case where the defendant was accused of not providing enough information to meet the “amount of the debt” threshold of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. The case, Carlin v. Davidson Fink, has been remanded back to the District Court.

STUDY CONCLUDES THE MORE PATIENTS HAVE TO PAY, THE LESS THAT WILL BE PAID

• Healthcare facilities need to do a better job of segmenting individuals who are true “self-payers” for their hospital bills against those who are “self-payers after insurance” (SPAI), which includes those with high-deductible health plans (HDHPs), according to a benchmarking report released this month by Crowe Horwath. True self-pay accounts, generally those without insurance, only pay six cents for every dollar they are billed, compared with 15 cents for SPAI individuals.

CALL FROM DEBT COLLECTOR LEADS WOMAN TO SHOOT BB GUN AT TEEN NEICE & NEPHEW

• A Tennessee woman allegedly took out her frustration and anger over a call from a debt collector on her teenaged niece and nephew last week, shooting a BB gun at them and hitting the 13-year old girl.  The woman had also consumed several beers and shot herself in the leg as well. She is facing charges of aggravated assault and aggravated domestic assault.

PENN CREDIT OWNER SPENDING $8M ON NEW OFFICE COMPLEX

• Donald Donagher, the owner of Penn Credit Corp., is paying nearly $8 million to buy a 12-acre property to house more than 40,000 square feet of office space, allowing him to expand his collection agency to more than 400 employees. An avid helicopter pilot, according to a published report Donagher is going to seek permission to add a helicopter pad to the new office complex. He is selling his current office building for $1.6 million.

AFSA SUBMITS REGULATORY REFORM WISH LIST TO WHITE HOUSE

• The American Financial Services Association, following a meeting with Vice President Mike Pence’s chief economist, has submitted a wish list of regulatory reforms to the White House. AFSA is a trade group that represents consumer lending companies. The submission included a request to reform the TCPA, along with halting examinations from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, withdrawing compliance bulletin 2015-07 on the in-person collection of consumer debt, and a general review of CFPB procedures, among others.

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The Daily Digest is sponsored by TCN, a leading provider of cloud-based call center technology for enterprises, contact centers, BPOs, and collection agencies worldwide.