No one can be legally served by phone, fax, email, text message, or even smoke signals.
This is a common ploy by criminals attempting to extort money from people by scaring you into believing that you will be criminally charged, go to jail, lose your driver’s license, have wages garnished, etc. all for an alleged or nonexistent debt.
Federal law (FDCPA) requires them to send you a letter (US MAIL ONLY) within 5 days of their first contact that contains their name, physical address, the creditor’s name, and the amount of the alleged debt. It also must contains “mini-Miranda” telling you that it is an attempt to collect a debt and that all information will be used for those purposes. The one other important thing that this letter must also have in it is that you have a right to dispute the debt within 30 days receipt of the letter and if you do so, all collection activity must be stopped until the debt is verified.
Read up on your rights here, get template letters to send and also make a complaint at this government site: http://www.consumerfinance.gov/
Also file a complaint with your State Attorney General's office.
List of State AG’s offices: http://consumerfraudreporting.org/stateattorneygenerallist.php
I received the same call. This rude woman told me they were filing a civil suit against my daughter..
I figured it was a scam. I gave her my daughter's phone number.. I think it's to scare seniors into paying
to save a member of their family from being sued..
Well, I got a call from this number and they are saying they have a civil suit against me, I didn't disclose a thing about myself so they said ok and hanged up. This seem to be a number in FL. Well, they can keep their civil suit there.