FDCPA Short Note: Class Certified Against Encore For "HSB/" Dunning Letters

BLAREK v. ENCORE RECEIVABLE MANAGEMENT, INC., USDC-WIED No. 06-C-420, 2007 U.S.Dist. LEXIS 58182, before USMJ Callahan, filed 08 Aug 2007.

Plaintiff owed a debt to Citibank USA, N.A. that she discharged in bankruptcy. Later, she received a mass-mailed form dunning letter from Encore that attempted to collect the same debt. The letter claimed that Plaintiff owed the debt to creditor "HSB/" instead of Citibank. Plaintiff sued Encore in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin per 15 U.S.C. §§ 1692e and 1692g(a)(2) for misrepresenting the name of the creditor. Plaintiff also moved to certify a class of similarly situated plaintiffs.

The trial court considered the four prerequisites of federal class certification: (1) numerosity, which Encore did not dispute, and a class of 40 or more is clearly numerous; (2) commonality, or common nucleus of operative fact, which was present because Encore sent the same "HSB/" letter to all class members; (3) typicality, which was present because each class member's claim rested on the same legal theory that Encore's "HSB/" representation was confusing and deceptive, regardless of whether Plaintiff had an additional FDCPA claim for Encore's trying to collect a bankrupted debt; and (4) adequacy of representation, which was present because Plaintiff only needed to give a deposition and did not have to know much if anything about the case, and Plaintiff's class counsel was very experienced in consumer class actions.

Then the trial court had to rule whether class action was superior to any other way of resolving the case. Statutory damages would be $100 to $1,000 for each plaintiff, probably not enough to inspire individual actions, and class actions exist primarily to enable many together to do what one or few could not. Legal and factual questions of whether "HSB/" confused an unsophisticated consumer, which did not depend on whether class members were actually confused or even if they read the letter, were common to all. CLASS CERTIFICATION GRANTED.

EDITORIAL: Another greedy junk debt buyer learns a slightly expensive lesson in compliance. Does nobody at Encore even read these stupid letters? Wouldn't it have cost less to get the name of the creditor right instead of getting sued? There are dozens of entities under the HSBC empire, some of whom lend money, but none of them is called "HSB/" and from "HSB/" it is impossible to tell which, if any, of HSBC's tentacles is supposed to be owed. Putting a nonexistent company name on dunning letters is plain premeditated carelessness. Good job to Ademi & O'Reilly LLP of Cudahy, Wisconsin for sticking a well-deserved pin into Encore Receivable Management, Inc.