The attorneys general of Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Guam, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia and Wyoming have all asked the Federal Trade Commission to increase the regulation of companies that have been offering debt relief to individuals and families in the United States.

One of the things that the FTC is currently considering imposing on the debt relief companies is to include them in the Telemarketing Sales Rule.

One wrong step from the Credit Solutions of America company led to the actions being filed. The company has been falsely claiming that it could reduce credit card debt by 50%. This angered Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan enough to sue the company and its CEO. In the lawsuit, Madigan states that Credit Solutions of America never go through with their end of the bargain and never actually negotiate with the creditors of their clients even though the clients stop paying their creditors directly and are actually making payments to Credit Solutions of America. Of course, because the creditors aren’t getting their money, they are suing the consumer to get their money; and winning.

Madigan has also said that her office has received over 12,000 complaints regarding this issue.

Some of the rules that the FTC is considering imposing on the debt relief companies include:

- Prohibiting the companies from charging the consumer anything until services have been performed. This would also require more disclosure to consumers; including how long it will take to settle the debts and how much it will cost.

- Prohibiting the company from being able to misrepresent things such as fees, success rates, and any other information that alludes to the impact of the debt relief services on the consumer’s credit report and credit history.

Some debt relief agencies actually do what they say they are going to do, but other companies like this one listed in the lawsuit above are awful and need to be regulated. The companies that do what they state they do shouldn’t have an issue with the new regulations that are imposed on them. Because the companies already follow the rules, any new rules will just mean that it’s leveling the playing field for the good companies.

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What you can learn from this ebook

In the course of a busy day, you may write a check at the grocery store, charge tickets to a ball game, rent a car, mail your tax returns, change service providers for your cell phone, or apply for a credit card. In each transaction, you reveal bits of personal information, like your bank and credit card account numbers; your income; your Social Security number (SSN); or your name, address, and phone numbers a goldmine of information for an identity thief. Once a thief has that information, it can be used without your knowledge to commit fraud or theft.

Identity theft is a serious crime. People whose identities have been stolen can spend time and money cleaning up the mess the thieves have made of their good name and credit record. They may lose out on job opportunities, and loans for education, housing, or cars. They may even get arrested for crimes they didn’t commit.

Can you prevent an identity theft? As with any crime, you cannot completely control whether you will become a victim. But according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the nation’s consumer protection agency, you can minimize your risk by managing your personal information cautiously.

What you can learn from this ebook

You’ve worked hard for your money, and made every attempt to be a conscientious saver. So it’s only natural that you want some control over what happens to your assets in the event of your death. At the very least, you probably want to minimize or avoid potential hassles and headaches for your loved ones.

Estate planning deals with what happens to your assets after you die. Even if you are a person of modest means, you have an estate and several strategies to choose from to make sure that your assets are distributed as you wish and in a timely way. The right strategies depend on your individual circumstances. That is, what is best for your neighbor might not make the most sense for you.

The Federal Trade Commission has finally taken some action toward the auto warranty “robo calls” that has been going on for at least the past year. These companies that have been cold calling warning consumers about their auto warranty ending, have been calling numbers that are on the Do Not Call list as well as companies and private numbers. It has gotten pretty annoying.

The FTC estimates that over a billion of these annoying “Your Car Warranty Has Expired” calls has been made.

The two companies named in the suit are Voice Touch Inc. and Transcontinental Warranty Inc. The injunction is also meant to get the companies to give back any gains that were gotten from these robo calls.

A large amount of investigation had to take place to track the companies down because they took outrageous measures to conceal their identities.

If fines are to be issued to these companies due to their violation of the Do Not Call act, then it would easily put the companies out of business. Over the past year, with a billion calls made, I’m sure there has been several thousand violations of the act.

I have personally received a call about my auto warranty twice. The first time I got the call, I called Toyota to try to figure out what was going on simply because it wasn’t a very well known scheme then. Now, everyone I know has received a call about their auto warranty at least once. One of my friends has actually gotten a call about her auto warranty for her 11 year old car.

It is time for this company to take responsibility for all the problems it has caused people. There are consumers who did fall for the telemarketing sale and haven’t had much luck with getting a claim filed on the warranty.

So this is an extreme case of telemarketing and violation of the Do Not Call registry, but maybe the FTC can make an example out of this company and will force other companies that are thinking about doing the same thing to take some time and think twice.

Comcast was not charged with contacting numbers on the National Do Not Call Registry, but the commission said it “found its entity-specific Do Not Call violations serious and pervasive enough to warrant a complaint,” the commission said.

In a statement, Comcast said it “fully supports all Do-Not-Call regulations and we are committed to preventing unwanted telemarketing calls. The FTC found our compliance with the national Registry to be 99.85 percent and chose not to pursue any claim against Comcast in that area. This settlement is limited to alleged calls made to persons identified on our internal do-not-call list, where our compliance percentage was at 99.74 percent. Both compliance percentages are greater than those reported by the FTC to Congress last year as evidencing ‘highly effective’ performance. Since the period under review, we have further strengthened our policies and procedures to prevent unwanted telemarketing calls.”

At least Comcast is paying up and is recognizing the fact that it was doing something wrong. I fully support the do not call list, but think it should be more strictly enforced. Perhaps with Comcast coming up with almost a million dollar fine, there will be even less telemarketers, but probably not.