After three years of litigation, charges brought by the Federal Trade Commission and the State of New York against Delaware Solutions have been settled. The charges related to a bogus debt collection scam operated by Delaware Solutions in which they falsely portrayed themselves as attorneys or process servers and threatened their unsuspecting victims with arrest or lawsuits if they did not pay debts that Delaware Solutions knew were phony. If you were a victim of this scam, you may be eligible for a refund. For more information about this refund program, click on the FTC Scam Refunds tab at the top of the first page of http://www.scamicide.com. There are no fees involved with receiving a refund through this program. Anyone contacting you about this refund program who demands a fee or payment of any kind is a scammer.
TIPS
Subject to strict federal laws, legitimate debt collectors are permitted to call debtors, however, the law prohibits them from threatening imprisonment for the failure to pay a debt and attempting to collect a debt that the debt collector knows is bogus.
It can be difficult to know when someone calls attempting to collect a debt if indeed they are legitimate or not, so the best course of action if you receive such a call is to not discuss the debt with the person calling, but instead demand that they send you a written “validation notice” by regular mail which describes the debt they allege you owe and includes a listing of your rights under the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.  Never give personal information over the phone to anyone who calls you attempting to collect a debt. You can never be sure who they are.  If you receive the validation notice and it appears to be legitimate, you may be better off contacting your creditor directly because the person who called you may not be representing the creditor, but may merely have information about the debt.
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