Strangely, two weeks after the death of my father, this person calls my Mom daily to inform her that there is a lawsuit against Steven Cutshaw.  Obviously they have the wrong phone number and name.  However, my Mom is somewhat gullible and thought that these people are out to get her.  She even made an appointment with a lawyer.  I listened to the message and told her it's a scam and don't worry about it.  She still calls me daily freaking out.  I'd love to talk to these people and give them a piece of my mind. Maybe next time I'm in New York, I'll look them up!

<MESSAGE TRANSCRIPTION>
"This is a Legal Notification for Steven Cutshaw. There is a lawsuit filed in your name and social security number (last four digits are XXYZ).  You are under investigation and I need you to call me back on my number 347-491-5135. I repeat 347-491-5135. If you fail to call me at this number, these documents will be handed over to the investigation team.  (Unintelligible mumbling in heavy indian accent, loud background noises, phones ringing, etc.) We will be investigating you at your workplace as well as your residence.  Therefore before this investigation starts I need you to call back ... investigation team... FBI. Thank You.
</MESSAGE TRANSCRIPTION>

Got a call from a Kevin Markin said their was a legal issue against my name and social security number. I got calls from this number berore about a couple of years ago and they would call my work and call the front desk people who answered the phone horrible names and would call over and over again. I now work somewhere else and now they constantly call my cell phone number. This is a scam and the police can do nothing about it. The man has a very heavy Indian accent and is hard to understand. He said he was from BCS and the phone # is 347-491-5135. Do not pay him it is a scam!

I am receiving these calls to have received them off and on for the year when I request information and refuse to pay until I get it they usually leave me alone for a while,  they always start with 347 but the last digits change, last month I blocked the number from my cell so the man began to call my work and demanded that I let him speak with my superviser, I explained to my superviser what was happening so he talked to her and told her that she should fire me related to I do not pay my bills and he wanted her to tell me to pay (or make me pay), my supervisor told him I was not allowed to receive personal phone calls at work and not to call back he called her a few names and demanded to talk to me, he told me that he was going to make shure I got fired from my job if I did not pay this payday loan (that I never took out), he kept calling my work number over and over and yelling at everyone who answered the phone (called one of my co workers a bi***) and then would hang up and call right back we propably got over 40 calls one right after the other, now he is (or some one from the same place) started calling yesterday again I was not at work and my co worker explained that I was gone for the day he told her she was lieing and he would call back and hung up on her, now today he has called again using the name of Charles and gave the office manager a number to call him back (347)491-5135 but all it does is go strait to music and no one answers, my supervisor did call the local police last month but he stated there was really nothing they could do to stop the calls he said hopefully they will get tired of wasting their time and just stop calling, so if anyone know how to stop them from calling please let me know.

I had a man call my parents house, my cell phone, and my job yesterday said his name was David Jones left me a msg to call him back asap that it was conerning a legal matter and that there had been some allegations generally used by me using my social security number and that there were charges pending so when i called the number which was 347-491-5135 and there was nothing but this music playn and noone answered so i hung up and called this morning and asked for David Jones and he said he is out right now that he was his supervisor could he help me and i said well im tryn to find out what this was all about he then asked me for my numbers he called me at and im told him he called my job and my cell phone they even knew where i worked and my bank which really freaked me out said that i had taken out a payday loan from cash advance USA and i never paid it back so their filing a lawsuit and and taking me to court and i tried to tell him that i have never taken a payday loan out from there that someone else must of used my information cause i recently gotten my car broke in at my job so i was tryn to tell him and he said he didn't care about my purse or my car gettn broken into and stolen that i better hire me a attorney cause that i will b getting supheanied to court and they will b comn to my job to b served with papers to show up to court and hung up on me he was mean and rude to me how do i stop these harrasing calls and how did they get all my info what has anyone done about it well it had me scared cause i know i never recieved nor applied for a payday loan from cash advance USA

**I stress the 'Indian' accent and music only to demonstrate that I think I was calling out of country or to match the information from previous contributors.  
A man  called my cell from # 347-347-1122 on caller ID.   He left a msg that his name was Ray Wilson & was calling from    347-491-5135.  I couldnt understand him well due to a  strong Indian accent.  He was calling  from PCS  (sounded like)  about a  "legal issue stemmed from my relationship with 'friends name')"   I do know someone by this name & am friends with him on facebook but have not seen him in 20+ years.  Certainly I haven't had any business transactions.   The call went on to say legal action would be brought against me in relation to this person.   He said to have them call him.    

I called this number left on VM   (The number on caller ID was non-working)  and no one even answered or spoke to me.   Music began to play like Indian style.   I was on hold a long time when someone aske to help me...I ask for Ray Wilson and was told to hold on.   I was left on hold over 15 minutes then disconnected.    I called again.  This type a person with an Indian accent answered & I asked for Ray Wilson he said he "was a  Supervisor could he help me".   I had to ask for his name which he Said was Shuan Davis.   He asked for the number they called me on and I gave it.   He had my name AND the name they told me they were calling about.   They said this person had given my  name as a  reference for a  Pay Day loan and now I owe the money.   I told them I had not seen this person in 20 years and I was not responsible for their loans.   I informed him that just giving ones name does not make them responsible for it or I wouldn't be making a mortgage payment!   LOL!    I advised him not to call me anymore.   He said OK...we shall see.     I called my friend and told him to beware.  He said HE DID NOT GET a loan and he certainly didn't use me as a  reference.    Thank you for this site...very helpful to stop these idiots.   I am going to hang up and report this to the FCC.  I am so busy and this was really a  waste of my time.

Thank you.

I would investgate the (347-491-5135).....THESE PEOLE ARE FRAUD!!!!...

These people are calling my friends with threats telling them to save themselves with legal matters by paying a payday loan that I did not make!!!!!!....Ps. there was no money put into my account for any pay day loan!!!!

Received a call today from a Bill Hawkins said he was from a company called public consolidation and that I owed them money. He called my job 10 times, I have been harrassed by these same people same time last year and had to refer them to an attorney no sooner than I told them that I didn't hear back from anyone. They have yet to send me a bill of any sort. I then called them back from my cell phone and got a Jordan Negative, still foreign and when I asked him what his title was, address, etc he refused to give me. I advised him that I have worked collections over 10 years and I know the law and that this is not a form of collections but of harrassing and that if he had any questions he can contact my attorney. He asked what type of attorney he was after I provided the attorney's name and number and I told him to google him. He proceeded to hang up. When I called the number back the guy kept saying I was bothering him and finally after I called back two more times to get information the guy stopped answering the phone. Now you tell me if your a collection agency and I owe a bill why is it a problem for you to send me any detailed information or speak to me in a professional manner. The next time they call I will be handling it legally.

This gentleman called my mother telling her I was in debt with a $500 loan. That I was committing a fraud.

I get an angry phone call from my mom. I have to explain to her that I never once took out a $500 loan, let alone gave our her information.

She then gave me the number and I called this guy back. Got a guy with an Indian accent that sounded like he was at a busy call center. Asked me how he could help me.

I told him that someone from that number called my mother. I told him they claimed I owed a load for $500. He asked me the last 4 of my SSN and then told me it was a $300 payday loan and the amount I owe is $500 due to interest.

I did apply for a $250 payday loan back in 2007 and I paid it all back by contacting a lawyer from Dallas, Texas. When I told him that he said that I will get a subpoena, and so will my mother and my friend. Then he quickly hung up.

Phantom Debt Collectors From India Harass Americans, Demand Money

By BRIAN ROSS (@brianross) , CINDY GALLI and MATTHEW MOSK (@mattmosk)
June 7, 2012

Hundreds of thousands of cash-strapped Americans have been targeted by abusive debt collectors operating out of overseas call centers suspected of links to organized crime in India, law enforcement officials told ABC News.

The calls are part of a massive scam, one that appears to target struggling Americans -- especially those who have gone online to apply for payday loans. Armed with personal information from those pilfered applications, the threatening callers, who claim to be debt collectors poised to initiate legal action, have managed to pry loose millions of dollars from their victims -- even when the victims never owed money in the first place.

"This is what we call a phantom debt collection scam," said Jon Leibowitz, the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. "It's a very pernicious and innovative new fraud."

Working through call centers in India, the commission estimates that the criminals have dialed at least 2.5 million calls, persuading already cash-strapped victims to send them more than $5 million. Some have reported receiving dozens of calls per hour. They are victims like Cindy Gervais, of New Orleans, who went online for a quick loan when her husband's car was hit by a driver who didn't have insurance.

Even though she paid the loan off, the so-called "phantom" debt collectors with Indian accents began calling to say she still owed money.

He more or less told me that if I didn't pay, they were going to have someone on my doorstep to arrest me," she told ABC News. "And that they were going to contact my place of business, and tell them what kind of person I am."

At first, she said she resisted. Then the calls became more frequent, and started to ring on her cell phone, and at the grocery distribution company where she had worked for 27 years.

"I was more or less was in panic mode because he told me there would be someone before noon at my place of business to arrest me and take me to jail," she said tearfully. "So I agreed to pay him."

After receiving scores of complaints, investigators with the FTC said they began tracking the calls, and following the payments. They alleged the payments led them to a California company run by an Indian-American named Kirit Patel, and that such scams would not be possible without American front men.

"I would say that all roads of this scam, or many of the roads of this scam, lead back to Mr. Patel," said the FTC's Leibowitz.

ABC News tracked Patel for weeks, from the suburbs of San Francisco to Austin, Texas.

Patel refused to talk. But his lawyer, Mark Ellis, said he believes it is far too early to pass judgment on his client. Ellis, a Sacramento-based attorney, told ABC News that Patel was hired for a nominal fee to set up an American shell company, and had no idea what the call centers in India were doing.

"I can tell you, he was as snookered by the people in India as anybody," Ellis said. "He's a 69-year-old man who is nearing his retirement who thought all he had to do was set up some corporations and everything was on the up and up. He's completely dismayed that he has become the lightning rod of this entire problem."

A close friend of Patel's also defended him in a brief interview at his home, saying Patel was not trying to defraud anyone -- he was just an unwitting, bit player in a larger scheme.

"If Mr. Patel was just a cog in the wheel he seems to have been a pretty big cog," Leibowitz said. "It is clear that Patel was integrally involved with this scam."

Leibowitz points to thousands of pages of financial and phone records gathered by the FTC and filed as part of a civil case brought against him in the U.S. District Court in Sacramento last month. When FTC lawyers sought to freeze his assets and prevent his business from continuing to operate, Patel responded by invoking his rights against self-incrimination. His lawyer told ABC News he has had to be careful in how he responds to the allegations in civil court "because there is a potential criminal action," but that Patel maintains the allegations against him are false.

Federal investigators said the phantom debt collection operation that allegedly benefitted from Patel's assistance was one of several that all trace back to the same small town in Western India called Ahmedabad. Callers use technology to make it appear that the calls originate inside the U.S. Victims provided ABC News with recordings of dozens of the calls, and many of the thickly accented callers appear to be reading off a script.

"Subpoenas have been readied, and Monday morning you're going to be picked up from your home," one caller says on a victim's voicemail. "And you have children. Don't worry about your children. We have a childcare department to take care of the children."

"You will be behind bars for six months," said another caller. "And once you go behind bars, you will lose your job. Once you are behind the bars, you won't get a single drop of water."

William Peerce Howard, a Tampa attorney who represents victims of harassment from debt collectors, said it takes an especially twisted criminal to use threats and coercion to pry money from someone who is already struggling financially

"These guys really are the most visible villains in America today," he said. "They make a living scaring people."

Mark Merola, of Florida, said he just panicked when the caller told him he might be arrested at the deli where he works in a Florida retirement community.

"I was nervous. I didn't want to embarrass myself, my family," he said. He used his debit card to pay the collector $576.

Afterwards, he says he realized "how stupid I was."

"It just happened so fast," he said. "I got scared."

Leibowitz said he hopes with more attention, future potential targets of the scam will recognize red flags before they turn over any money.

If callers say they are from the police, consumers should know that law enforcement officers do not collect debt for private parties. If the caller is speaking with a thick Indian accent, but calls themselves by a names such as Officer Mike Johnson, that should be a tip off. And if they're calling 40 times in two hours, that's another red flag. "Legitimate debt collectors, legitimate pay day lenders don't do those sorts of things," he said.

Merola said he would like to see anyone involved in the scam prosecuted aggressively.

"There's no place in society for these people," he said.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/phantom-debt-co ... 16512428&page=2

I got a call from this number saying he was Eric Johnson and when I told him I was going to call my lawyer and get him involved he hung up on me...its a SCAM!!!!!!!!!SCAM!!!!!!!!!!

i keep getting a call from a guy name kevin saying i owe loans that i haven't recieved....he has also called my job too.

Got a call. He said he was Dave from PCF or something like that.  He ask me to call him back.
After he gave me the number he said God Bless.

Received a phone call from this person who he says is Dave with PCF or something like that.  He asked me to call him back. Took his number and he said God Bless!

I just saw the do not use caps!! Sorry.

calls constantly says I have several loans out that I didn't have.Scam!!!!!!!Scam!!!!!!!!!!!!SCAM>DON't pay these people!!!!!!!!.

I received a call from this number from a man stating his name was David Jones.  He didn't give me any other information