debts Archives

Uncle Sam Wants YOU to Report Deceptive Debt Collectors

American consumers now have not one, but two federal agencies they can call upon for help dealing with abusive debt collectors.

The Federal Trade Commission has brought several cases against problem debt collectors over the past couple of years. And the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has started publishing rules debt collectors have to follow to conduct business fairly.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The CFPB was set up to be the first federal agency solely focused on making consumers get a fair shake from financial firms. The agency has pulled many non-traditional financial providers into its purview, such as debt collectors. Recently the CFPB created five form letters consumers can use when dealing with debt collectors to make sure they are treated fairly.

Click here to read about the CFPB’s jurisdiction over debt collectors.

Click here to submit a debt collector complaint to the CFPB.

Click here for downloadable form letters that help you instruct a debt collector not to contact you anymore, to request proof that a debt is really yours and more.

h/t – abcnews

Debt Ceiling FAQs

NEW YORK (CNNMoney)

Congress narrowly avoided pushing the country off the fiscal cliff. But it has done nothing to address the next and potentially bigger risk to the economy: the need to raise the debt ceiling.

To help separate fact from fiction in the battle, here’s what you need to know about the issue.

Why does it need to be raised? The debt ceiling needs to be raised for a simple reason – because both parties in Congress have approved tax cuts and spending increases over recent years, knowing full well this will add to deficit. Raising the debt ceiling then, ensures that we are able to pay for services we’ve already used. It is not a “license to spend more,” as some Republicans assert. It simply lets the Treasury Department continue to pay all the country’s obligations that Congress has already approved — whether it’s a payment to a federal contractor, a Social Security check to a senior, or interest on the debt to a bond investor.

Read more…

HEY! DID YOU KNOW THAT…

Since 1980, the debt ceiling has been raised 39 times:

17 times under Ronald Reagan,

4 times under Bill Clinton

7 times under George W. Bush.

Congress was controlled by Democrats for most of those increases. However, Republicans never faltered when they were in control.

The debt ceiling is not a spending ceiling. Administrations can issue all the checks it wants because the Fed simply creates money from thin air to make the deposits allowing your checks to clear.