Collection Agency Hit With Class Action Over Harassing Phone Calls

A Florida woman is suing CBE Group Inc. for allegedly making unwanted and harassing phone calls, regarding an alleged debt, which is a violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA).

According to the TCPA lawsuit, CBE Group had begun contacting Plaintiff Lakeeshia B. regarding an alleged debt for household expenses. At some point, her alleged debt had been transferred to CBE Group, which led to Lakeeshia experiencing the unwanted cell phone calls.

It is important to note that before CBE Group acquired the Lakeeshia’s alleged debt, she had no prior contact or business with the defendant. Additionally, Lakeeshia claims she had never given the company any prior express consent to contact her in any way, including her cellphone.

Within one year, CBE Group had called Lakeeshia numerous times in an attempt to collect the debt. Each of these unsolicited phone calls were made without her permission, and at no point did the defendant offer her an opt-out option, according to the TCPA lawsuit.

Shortly after the company began calling her, Lakeeshia had requested that the company cease calling her. The defendant reportedly ignored this request, and continued to pester the plaintiff with unwanted phone calls related to the debt, directly violating the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA).

This federal policy was adopted in 1977 to protect consumers from abusive debt collective practices, which involved harassing or threatening the debtor.

Under the FDCPA, a debtor is described as any person who icurs a debt to pay for an expense, while a debt collector is defined as any person that uses interstate commerce and contacts consumers to collect debts.

Along with allegations of illegal debt collection, Lakeeshia claims that the company had violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) multiple times, by persistently calling her and not providing her an opt-out option.

What is the TCPA?

For most TCPA lawsuits, recipients are often bombarded with robo-calls made by automatic telephone dialing systems, wasting the recipient’s time and money. The TCPA was established in 1991, when he government found that persistent spam calls were fairly common from companies.

Even though the CBE Group TCPA lawsuit did not cite any mention of robo-calls, it alleges the company had violated TCPA rules by calling her without permission and had continued to call her despite being asked to stop.

Under the TCPA, companies must keep consumers on a do-not-call registry for a certain number of years, before initiating contact again. CBE Group did not adhere to this policy, allegedly incurring more TCPA violations.

Overview of FDCPA Compliance and TCPA Violations

According to the TCPA lawsuit, CBE Group did not comply with any of the federal regulations mentioned above and had caused severe emotional distress to Lakeeshia.

In order to be in compliance with both regulations, the defendant had to have been able to identiy themselves and what company they worked for, and had provided an opt-out option for Lakeeshia.

Additionally, both the TCPA and FDCPA require companies to cease calling the consumers, once the consumers request so. Each FDCPA allegation could potentially be $1,000 per violation, with TCPA charges ranging between $500 to $1500.

Lakeeshia is filing legal action against CBE Group for not only failing to follow FDCPA rules and committing TCPA violations, but for also causing her severe emotional distress and mental stress.

Lakeeshia’s lawyers state that CBE Group had the civil responsibility of following the FDCPA and TCPA, in order for them to respect the privacy of their consumers.

The CBE Group TCPA Class Action Lawsuit is Case No. 0:15-cv-61744-DPG, in the U.S. District Court of Southern Florida, Fort Lauderdale Division.

Join a Free TCPA Class Action Lawsuit Investigation

If you were contacted on your cell phone by a company via an unsolicited text message (text spam) or prerecorded voice message (robocall), you may be eligible for compensation under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.

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