??Has anyone met a debt collector in their "civilian" life?

[IamOld]

The reason I ask is this - I have a day job and several p/t jobs including teaching...I just ran into a fellow who is a debt collector - put this person in his place... :-)

What do you think the odds are that in our real lives we run into one person/outfit that is also "after" us???

[lillymarlene]

A friend of my boyfriend, up until about 2 years ago, was the mortgage bill collector for a small regional bank. So I guess my chance of running into somebody like that are pretty good. LOL Fortunately, I never had any dealings with that individual's bank. Then, surprisingly when hearing of our situation, this person strongly reccomended I BK.

"What do you think the odds are that in our real lives we run into one person/outfit that is also "after" us???"... I would say pretty good. I've also learned from Boyfriend's pal that most people in that horrible "profession" are terrified of their clients finding out who they really are, and often use aliases. This collector too, sometimes when meeting new people, would just claim that he was a loan officer at a bank.

[newbie2]

The reason I ask is this - I have a day job and several p/t jobs including teaching...I just ran into a fellow who is a debt collector - put this person in his place... :-)

What do you think the odds are that in our real lives we run into one person/outfit that is also "after" us???

I don't understand..why would you "put this person in his place"? Did you know that he didn't follow guidelines while doing his job? Was he one that called you and was abusive?

[fslady]

We had a secretary who was a bill collector in a former life. For a while all was well, until she started using her "collectors" voice and attitude on customers and colleagues. She was gone quickly! We couldn't afford someone who antagonized so many people so often.

[disconapper]

I used to run a large call center, we were a lead generation company for the mortgage industry back during the "boom" times of the late 90's and early 00's, a very successful call center. I hired a shift manager who used to run a debt collection call center. He told me stories about how his agents would make people cry, how they would skip-trace them, and they'd get bonuses if they were sued, he'd even take the agents to court so they could watch the person get a judgement. His stories made me ill, he seemed to get a kick out of making people miserable, how sad. I ended up firing him because his personality just didn't suit my tastes and his tactis with our customers and my employees was just to aggressive. I told him one day during a performance review that he was just to rough on our agents for hitting sales goals, just to rough, we were low pressure sales, afterall, the market was basically dictating our success. He didn't seem to grasp the concept, two weeks later I gave him his walking papers.

[iswmle]

At my job I often have to call our collections dept. Any call to collections we have to introduce the customer to the next rep, plus collections does not get the customer's profile on their computer so we have to give it to them. Those reps are rude! One of them was so bad to me I ended up complaining to my QA and sup who went to the collections rep sup because her professionalism was just nonexistent. I work in Credit Card Services and everyone in my dept. hates putting a call in to collections because they are just so terrible... and they're hold music is loud and obnoxious, too.

[lillymarlene]

The bill collector I know, believe it or not, just thinks that his clients actually like him. LOL My boyfriend has tried to explain to him that for example, his debtor customers probably send him thank you notes and such, is because they are afraid of losing their homes.

[BKorbust]

Met a bill collector a couple of months ago face to face. They wanted a market analysis for their house and were a few months behind in their mortgage. I gave them the unfortunate news their house was worth 100K less than they thought but they still had some equity. They never listed their house with me or anyone else. They were going through a rough patch just like me. It's happening to a lot of us.

[IamOld]

At my job I often have to call our collections dept. Any call to collections we have to introduce the customer to the next rep, plus collections does not get the customer's profile on their computer so we have to give it to them. Those reps are rude! One of them was so bad to me I ended up complaining to my QA and sup who went to the collections rep sup because her professionalism was just nonexistent. I work in Credit Card Services and everyone in my dept. hates putting a call in to collections because they are just so terrible... and they're hold music is loud and obnoxious, too.

Fascinating! So even people working for the same corp don't like these folks!!!!

[alaskathryn]

I'll go ahead and put my neck out there; I work with a group of collectors every day at a local credit union. Fortunately our CU has member service as a prime directive and we do pretty much everything we can to help members out who are experiencing bad fortune, whether it be extensions, forbearances, whatever we can to resolve issues. It's unfortunate that dealing straight with people is met with skepticism, I get calls often from people who can't believe I'm not yelling at them or that I wish them well in their journey.

[IamOld]

I will say alaska, that my...former...CU has been very polite and nice...I really wish I could exclude them from the BK but of course that is not possible...

Mind you I'm quite sure they'd eventually sue me.

[drowning123]

I have a friend who rides the train with me, who's a debt collector, but she only collects 6- and 7-figure debts, maybe some 5-figures.

[IamOld]

I have a friend who rides the train with me, who's a debt collector, but she only collects 6- and 7-figure debts, maybe some 5-figures.

Then he and I may know each other :-)

[drowning123]

I'll ask her if she knows a guy by the name of "IamOld." LOL. Funny, she never really discusses her job. She doesn't even have the personality for this type of job, but it pays her bills.

[IamOld]

And Drowning, that's the sad thing...he's got his bills to pay - there was a story on bbc world service this morning about the Las Vegas sheriff's office doing a booming business on evictions...I don't know how those guys live with themselves...but then...they've go their own bills to pay.

The system is using the working class to oppress the working class!!!