-EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS ALERT- Emergency preparedness is a catchphrase of late, what with the catastrophic weather and similar events in the news. But along with having enough water and stocking up on non-perishable food, financial preparedness should be considered of nearly equal importance, saving you from spiraling debt and the harassing debt collector. Below are the…
Study Shows Many Choosing to Pay Off Debts While Sacrificing Needed Health Care to Save Money A recent study conducted by sociologists at the University of Michigan found that people who are ill and do not seek treatment because of the cost are more likely to have credit card debt than any other form of…
Craig Kimmel of the Kimmel and Silverman law firm joins Hal Donahue for the weekly segment of What Vets Need to Know on The Union Edge, discussing the dangers of Pension Loans. For more information, news and help for debt collector harassment and how to stop collection calls, visit our social media outlets: Stop…
A resident of West Philadelphia is alleging that a debt collector has engaged in unlawful practices. Kimmel & Silverman, P.C. has filed a complaint against national debt collection company Virtuoso Sourcing, Inc., on behalf of Crystal Monroe. The lawsuit was filed on May 21 in United States District Court, Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The complaint…
Federal regulators are widening an investigation into whether the nation’s biggest banks used flawed documents and incomplete records to collect on delinquent credit card debts, according to four people familiar with the probe. The scope of the inquiry is unclear, but those familiar with it say the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is…
Seven years after Congress banned payday-loan companies from charging exorbitant interest rates to service members, many of the nation’s military bases are surrounded by storefront lenders who charge high annual percentage rates, sometimes exceeding 400 percent. The Military Lending Act sought to protect service members and their families from predatory loans. But in practice, the…
The Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation and the Division of Banks announced a series of cease orders targeting unlicensed lenders and a licensed debt collector that were not adhering to the state’s loan consumer protections. These loans are illegal under the Massachusetts small-loan statute because they include excessively high interest rates and…
Judgments against unsuspecting consumers for defaulted loans are being churned out by debt collectors like Midland Funding, using robo-signed affidavits of debt as substitutes for properly investigated, properly documented debt. Robo-signing is the mass-production of “sworn” affidavits used to prove outstanding debt in lawsuits against consumers. Most common among large debt collectors and debt buyers,…
Philadelphia Inquirer reporter John Timpane discovered that he was a victim of Identity Theft when a criminal filed a false tax return using his Social Security Number. After dealing with the IRS, FTC, multiple credit agencies and other organizations, he’s discovered a few tricks to help consumers foil Identity Theft. Since the mid-2000s, there has…
Making sound financial decisions starts with knowing your rights as a consumer Consumer advocates are hoping this month that April showers also bring May financial flowers for their clients, using National Financial Literacy Month as a springboard to get people to know their consumer rights to avoid being taken advantage of. According to www.financialliteracymonth.com, Americans…
