Collections/Creditors calling relatives of their customers

[kpence73]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Georgia, but relates to a person living in Florida


I will try to make this short. but there is a bit of history to the situation. My father passed away in September and my mother had a massive heart attack afterwards and was only given a 20% chance to survive, which she did. Doctors orders were she was not to deal with my dad's estate, creditors, etc because she did not need the stress. She now has a private phone number which no one but family has because we didn't want my dad's creditors calling and harrassing my mom concerning his estate. The only income was my father's social security which upon his death it stopped. My mother cannot pay her bills so friends/family are donating a few dollars here and there to help out. Needless to say, her creditors are the last to be paid if at all because electricity and rent are more imporant in my mind. Because of her heart attack, I have power of attorney to deal with her accounts and all of her creditors have been sent the power of attorney. Three days ago one of her creditors called me and I assumed it was because of the power of attorney. I was told the rep was in the "skip" department and she didn't call me because of the POA, but because she did a search for all of my mom's relatives and since I had lived at my mom's address at one point and I was born in the 70s, she assumed I was her son so she called me in order to reach my mom, but she wouldn't discuss anything with me or even allow me to explain the situation because she didn't have access to the part of the computer that showed me as POA. I had to speak to the POA department so they could update things. The next day someone called again from the collections department, again not seeing I was a POA, but just becuase I was a relative. This time I made the rep access the additional info to see I was a POA so I could explain the situation and as it turned out my mom qualified for a payment protection service she had been paying for and it was activated. Today I got another collection call, again not because I was a POA but because I am a relative. This time I was stern with the rep and said I had already spoken to the company as a POA for my mom and dealt with the issues. At this point I was considering their phone calls to me as harrassment because I am not even a customer with their company. I told the rep if they contacted me again for anything other than POA business I would file a harrassment suit against them. The rep said she took my phone number off my mom's account, but I doubt she did and I am expecting another call tomorrow.

Is it even legal for them to harrass relatives of their customers like that??? Just because I am my mother's son, I have to receive daily calls with the message, Please have Mrs. XXXX call as soon as possible. To me this doesn't seem right. According to the company they have my brother's phone number, my aunt's phone number, my grandparent's phone number, etc. The rep even proved it by telling my by brother's name, date of birth, and the area code and first 4 number of his phone. She even told me my current address to prove they had all this info. I figure they will start making the "rounds" since I requested they not call me. I told them if they needed to speak to my mom, they needed to send written correspondence to the address they have on file for her. They told me no.