I recieved a collections letter yesterday from AFNI. They claim I owe "Bell Atlantic" (now Verizon) the amazing sum of $40.60 from the rather vague period of [protected]. This came as quite a suprise to me, and I was initially quite angry about this because these people were demanding I prove that I paid a bill that at least 8 years old, that has never been in collections all that time? I smelled a rat like so many others have.
Today I called them back, and one AFNI associate even told me they do not have to send me proof and verification of my debt and that they do not have this information because it has been too long, and yet she had the temerity to demand I prove that I paid this paltry sum. I have a recording of her saying these things.
Folks, I don't know what is going on here, but I don't send people money just because they send me a letter claiming I owed somebody this money a decade ago, and I want proof because I have paid all of my bills and am not buying this. I guess I will send them a certified desist and verification demand, contact the FTC and the Attorney Generals' offices of NY, IL, and TN and contact the BBB as well as my lawyer and see what I can do to get to the bottom of this and see to it that everything is resolved.
From what I can determine based on extrapolating information about my own case and the cases of others, it seems that AFNI's just spun off onto a path that may lead to them being shut down.
90% of the complaints that are out there tend to fall into two categories:
1. Never lived there, never had that phone number, wrong person (they must be doing skip tracing and all sorts of other questionable stuff).
2. The bill is old "debt" beyond the statute of limitations from around the time period when NYNIX, MCI,Bell Atlantic, etc were are merging and record keeping was probably a mess and people were being moved by the company that would become Verizon from one phone company to another to another... and sometimes another all in a short amount of time.
People that fall into the latter category paid every bill sent to them, they were never billed for the alleged amount, nothing ever appeared on their credit reports and they were never in collections for this alleged debt.
In my particular case, AFNI representatives had all the dates wrong, the area code was wrong, they claimed the account closed long before it ever was transitioned to Verizon, and I paid every bill my providers ever sent me, and the amount they claim I owe is very small.
I have no idea what kind of data these people are looking at, but it's a bigger mess than my financial records from 10 years ago (I haven't kept every scrap, but I did keep posted checks, and fair number of phone bills from the year in question, and I have teamed up with my bank to track down every charge against my accounts for the year before the alleded billing date up until the year after that date, and just starting with my posted checks and the phone bills I have, I was paying (some very large) phone bills to the pre-Verizon entity they claim I had closed the account with a good 4 months after they claim I had been moved into Verizon.
SO there it is. They are up to something, and it smells illegal.
One more update: Between November 1999 and February 2000, Bell Atlantic lost 227,000 customer change orders and blamed this on software problems with their billing system. Bell Atlantic agreed to pay millions in fines and was aware that their billing system was having huge problems, so it may be that many people who paid their bills, dealt with any order snafus that were going on at that time, never received a bill or collection notice, and so on ... are now dealing with AFNI who is pouring over the same errant records that caused Bell Atlantic to pay millions in fines already.
There seems to be a lot of this going around lately. Bills, mistakes in billing, and id theft cases that were resolved around the time of various mergers suddenly going into a collection agency (AFNI) after Verizon sold off these bogus debts to AFNI as out of statute, uncollectable debt.
The culprits are AFNI and Verizon it seems. Sad, I will have to switch from my Verizon phone service that I have had for about 8 years over a little more than 30 bucks myself.
I can only tell you what everybody else already knows: dispute the debt if it is not yours or tell them you don't owe any money if you don't owe it, send in a certified letter telling them this and demanding that they validate their claims with proper documentation (billing history, bills, addresses and so on). Also make sure they are licensed to collect in your state, and all that other stuff.
Next, you need to inform the Attorneys General for your state, Illinois, and the State where the problem is happening, your state's Department of Consumer Affairs, and file a complaint with the Federal Trade Comission.
Everybody, this is happening to a lot of people right now: every billing mistake ever resolved with Bell Atlantic, NYNEX, etc, every ID fraud case already straightened out, etc, etc way back from the 1990s is suddenly coming to life again after Verizon sold off these bogus uncollectable debts to ANFI.
You can find a lot of resources out on the web about how to approach these cases, but most of them will tell you to send a dispute letter to them by certified mail and ask them for reasonable documentation (billing history, bills, judgements, etc) and telling them that you do not owe this money. Make sure the certified mail is return receipt requested so that you have proof you did this.
Next, you need to file complaints with the FTC, your state's department of consumer affairs, and the Attorneys General of Illinois, your own state, and the state where ANFI now alleges you incured the debt.
If they try to sue you or put this on your credit report, go get an attorney who specializes in consumer protection laws and sue them.
I was kind of suprised to discover that I actually do have bills, posted check receipts , etc from 1999 (I was almost certain I would have shredded everything prior to 2000 by now), and since my service continued much longer than Afni alleges, I did have a copy of the final bill, and I have to tell you folks that I have no idea what these Afni people are looking at when they create these collection notices. It's starting to smell a lot like deliberate fraud in my specific case. They have some information correct, some is so far off base it is laughable, checks were cashed every month and well beyond the time Afni says the account was closed, and the final bill reads, "Paid in Full".
I would strongly advise anybody receiving a notice from Afni to question the authenticity of their claims and take all neccessary steps to protect yourself.
