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Recommendation:
We suggest not answering the phone to talk to credit collectors.
It is a very negative experience and adds no value to your
taking control of the situation. If you do take the call,
then tell the caller to cease calling you and you are giving
notice that you will only deal with the original creditor.
If this is the original creditor, then have them send notice by
mail of the claim they calling about. It is vital to only
deal with creditors and collectors via mail... get everything in
writing. Shoot off the cease and
desist letter to "fire" the collection agency.
Caller ID:
Leverage the use of caller ID to track who is calling you.
Sometimes you are not even aware who is taking collections
actions against you. If you are getting repeated calls
from the same number and it is listed as "unknown" on your ID,
you can use the internet to identify the caller. There is
a yahoo Group name
Who-Called-Me that you can join to help in your search.
The moderator there posted these helpful hints:
Here are some tips for searching for a phone number and for
posting numbers to the group
SEARCHING
---------------------------------------
There are several resources available on the net that will help
you identify a number and the list below covers a wide
assortment of websites that will be useful.
--Google: http://www.google.com
(I always start out with this one, see tips below)
--BBB:
http://search.bbb.org/search.html
--Reverse Phone Directory:
http://www.reversephonedirectory.com/ (Searches
WhitePages.com, 411.com, and PhoneNumber.com)
--SuperPages.com:
http://yellowpages.superpages.com/yp.advanced.jsp?SRC=&STYPE=AP&CB=&C=&N=&A=&X=&\
P=&AL=&R=N&PS=15&RR=10&PP=&E=&T=&S=&Z=
--Internet Oracle:
http://www.internetoracle.com/finde.htm
--AnyWho:
http://www.anywho.com/rl.html
The ones below are paid searches
Intelius:
http://intelius.com/search-name.php?searchform=phone
KnowX:
http://knowx.com/rvph/search.jsp?userid=guest&password=welcome
--Google Search Tips--
When using Google to search using XXX-YYY-ZZZZ (EX:
888-555-1212) will yield the
best results, although sometimes you will want to try the
following:
XXXYYYZZZZ
(XXX) YYY-ZZZZ
XXX YYY-ZZZZ
You can also try using numbers adjacent to the one you are
looking for (like
888-555-1211, 888-555-1213) since many companies use blocks of
numbers. This
technique isn’t always accurate but it may help you find out
who’s calling you.
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