I recently had a collector email me asking me what the law is on emailing debtors regarding overdue accounts. They say many of their clients have given them email addresses, but they aren’t sure if they can legally communicate this way.
Another collector said they receive email addresses from consumers as well and they strongly advise against communicating via emails, but especially unsolicited communications. Some collectors advise consumers that ask to be contacted by email that they are not able to accommodate their request by law. If the collection issue is a commercial collection, many collectors will communicate via email since the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act does not apply.
A member of my American Credit & Collections Association that is in Romania sends unpaid invoices through email. And some businesses offer online viewing of invoices and customers have the ability to find an unpaid invoice on the web. Other agencies based in the United States are using online websites for skip tracing and some agencies I have talked to have improved their results with more than 25-30% once they started doing this.
Imagine the benefits if we could communicate via email. Stamps are p to $.44, and the aspect of becoming greener by communicating via email would be great. There seem to be many advantages but with many sue happy consumers or attorneys out there, I would be leery of doing this until laws are changed and specific regulation are in place regarding online communications with debtors in any form if you are a third party collector. As a business owner or credit manager you might want to consider mailing your invoices but emailing your statements to customers who would like to receive them this way.
Debt collectors need to be able to utilize new communication technologies to contact consumers because doing so would make their collection efforts more efficient. New technology offers contact methods that will increasingly become the norm. Any restrictions on the ability of collectors to contact consumers using new technologies will increase the amount of debt that goes uncollected. This will be addressed in the next roundtable discussion by the FTC.
When Congress enacted the FDCPA, it did not limit the methods a debt collector could use to contact a consumer except for prohibiting the use of postcards but this was before any new technology. However, it is important to remember that the FDCPA was enacted to prevent debt collectors from engaging in unfair, deceptive or abusive conduct in using any method to collect a debt. New technology raises questions and issues not considered when the FDCPA was enacted.
The FDCPA applies to third party collectors, business owners should check their specific state laws to see what they can or cannot do. Many state laws mirror the FDCPA laws.
This is an excerpt from the second edition of “Using Social Media in Collections, the risks, laws & mistakes” by Michelle Dunn available now!
