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… must come down. After the first across-the-board rise in every complaint category (since early 2016) in August, we are now looking at a significant across-the-board drop in every category for September. How significant? Every category is down by double digits, from 16.8% (BCFP complaints) to 31.5% (TCPA complaints).

What does this mean? Usually, not very much. Year-over-year, these numbers have tended to be remarkably consistent. However, if trends hold, litigation this year is on track to be about 5% lower than the last several years. That is not huge, but it is not insignificant either.

In other news, putative class actions were mixed last month with 22.6% of FDCPA, 29% of TCPA and 3.2% of FCRA lawsuits filed that way.

An unusually high 37% of all plaintiffs who filed suit last month had filed at least once before.

And finally, New York attorney Craig B. Sanders represented more consumers than anyone else in September (51) and also has represented more consumers than any other attorney all year (429, more than a hundred above his nearest competitor), retaining the title of most active consumer attorney of the year.

Current Month: Previous Month: Previous
Year:		 Year to Date: Year to
Date Comp:
Sep 01, 2018
Sep 30, 2018		 Aug 01, 2018
Aug 31, 2018		 Sep 01, 2017
Sep 30, 2017		 Jan 01, 2018
Sep 30, 2018		 Jan 01, 2017
Sep 30, 2017
BBB  3106 4306 -27.9% 4101 -24.3% 36144 36602 -1.3%
BCFP  3686 4431 -16.8% 3595 2.5% 40926 37128 10.2%
FDCPA  638 907 -29.7% 720 -11.4% 7018 7515 -6.6%
FCRA  339 433 -21.7% 556 -39.0% 3476 3327 4.5%
TCPA  248 362 -31.5% 298 -16.8% 2954 3455 -14.5%

 

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Complaint Statistics:

3106 consumers filed BBB complaints, 3686 consumers filed BCFP complaints, and about 1054 consumers filed lawsuits under consumer statutes from Sep 01, 2018 to Sep 30, 2018.

  • 3106 BBB Complaints
  • 3686 BCFP Complaints
  • 638 FDCPA, 144 Class Action (22.6%)
  • 248 TCPA, 72 Class Action (29.0%)
  • 339 FCRA, 11 Class Action (3.2%)

Litigation Summary (scroll down for BBB and BCFP data):

  • Of those cases, there were about 1054 unique plaintiffs (including multiple plaintiffs in one suit).
  • Of those plaintiffs, about 391, or (37%), had sued under consumer statutes before.
  • Combined, those plaintiffs have filed about 9102 lawsuits since 2001
  • Actions were filed in 150 different US District Court branches.
  • About 699 different collection firms and creditors were sued.

The top courts where lawsuits were filed:

  • 64 Lawsuits: Illinois Northern District Court – Chicago
  • 44 Lawsuits: Nevada District Court – Las Vegas
  • 40 Lawsuits: New York Eastern District Court – Brooklyn
  • 38 Lawsuits: Florida Middle District Court – Tampa
  • 37 Lawsuits: California Central District Court – Western Division – Los Angeles
  • 29 Lawsuits: Pennsylvania Eastern District Court – Philadelphia
  • 29 Lawsuits: Delaware District Court – Wilmington
  • 27 Lawsuits: Florida Southern District Court – Fort Lauderdale
  • 27 Lawsuits: Georgia Northern District Court – Atlanta
  • 26 Lawsuits: New York Eastern District Court – Central Islip

The most active consumer attorneys were:

  • Representing 51 Consumers: CRAIG B SANDERS
  • Representing 30 Consumers: DAVID H KRIEGER
  • Representing 29 Consumers: ANTRANIG N GARIBIAN
  • Representing 28 Consumers: NATHAN CHARLES VOLHEIM
  • Representing 26 Consumers: TAXIARCHIS HATZIDIMITRIADIS
  • Representing 24 Consumers: TODD M FRIEDMAN
  • Representing 23 Consumers: MARK A ELDRIDGE
  • Representing 19 Consumers: JOSEPH SCOTT DAVIDSON
  • Representing 19 Consumers: ADRIAN ROBERT BACON
  • Representing 18 Consumers: MOHAMMED OMAR BADWAN

Statistics Year to Date:
11005 total lawsuits for 2018, including:

  • 7018 FDCPA
  • 3476 FCRA
  • 2954 TCPA

Number of Unique Plaintiffs for 2018: 10738 (including multiple plaintiffs in one suit)

The most active consumer attorneys of the year:

  • Representing 429 Consumers: CRAIG B SANDERS
  • Representing 319 Consumers: NATHAN CHARLES VOLHEIM
  • Representing 295 Consumers: TAXIARCHIS HATZIDIMITRIADIS
  • Representing 266 Consumers: MOHAMMED OMAR BADWAN
  • Representing 226 Consumers: DAVID H KRIEGER
  • Representing 202 Consumers: ELLIOT GALE
  • Representing 189 Consumers: AHMAD TAYSEER SULAIMAN
  • Representing 174 Consumers: TODD M FRIEDMAN
  • Representing 157 Consumers: OMAR TAYSEER SULAIMAN
  • Representing 156 Consumers: MARK A ELDRIDGE

——————————————————————————————————-
BBB Complaint Statistics:

There were a total of 3106 BBB complaints from Sep 01, 2018 to Sep 30, 2018. That is down -27.9% from last month.

The types of companies being complained about were:

  • 1708 banks (55%)
  • 1150 collections-agencies (37%)
  • 248 credit+reporting (8%)

The categories of complaints filed were:

  • 1645 Billing/Collection Issues (53%)
  • 1312 Problems with Product/Service (42%)
  • 76 Advertising/Sales Issues (2%)
  • 51 Delivery Issues (2%)
  • 22 Guarantee/Warranty Issues (1%)

The dispositions of these complaints are:

  • 2414 The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction. (78%)
  • 555 The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction. (18%)
  • 109 The business failed to respond to the dispute. (4%)
  • 17 BBB is unable to locate the business. (1%)
  • 11 The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it. (0%)

——————————————————————————————————-
BCFP Complaint Statistics:

There were 3686 complaints filed against debt collectors from Sep 01, 2018 to Sep 30, 2018.

Total number of debt collectors complained about: 815

The types of debt behind the complaints were:

  • 1069 Other debt (29%)
  • 813 Credit card debt (22%)
  • 779 I do not know (21%)
  • 568 Medical debt (15%)
  • 143 Auto debt (4%)
  • 97 Payday loan debt (3%)
  • 88 Mortgage debt (2%)
  • 73 Private student loan debt (2%)
  • 56 Federal student loan debt (2%)

Here is a breakdown of complaints:

  • 1655 Attempts to collect debt not owed (45%)
  • 811 Written notification about debt (22%)
  • 485 Communication tactics (13%)
  • 342 Took or threatened to take negative or legal action (9%)
  • 303 False statements or representation (8%)
  • 90 Threatened to contact someone or share information improperly (2%)

The top five subissues were:

  • 859 Debt is not yours (23%)
  • 576 Didnt receive enough information to verify debt (16%)
  • 411 Debt was result of identity theft (11%)
  • 306 Debt was paid (8%)
  • 284 Frequent or repeated calls (8%)

The top states complaints were filed from are:

  • 517 Complaints: TX
  • 418 Complaints: FL
  • 400 Complaints: CA
  • 223 Complaints: GA
  • 194 Complaints: NY
  • 126 Complaints: IL
  • 125 Complaints: PA
  • 101 Complaints: NJ
  • 98 Complaints: AZ
  • 95 Complaints: OH

The status of the month’s complaints are as follows:

  • 2834 Closed with explanation (77%)
  • 456 Closed with non-monetary relief (12%)
  • 234 In progress (6%)
  • 141 Untimely response (4%)
  • 21 Closed with monetary relief (1%)

This includes 3494 (95%) timely responses to complaints, and 192 (5%) untimely responses.

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Individual Search Engine


Instantly and easily search our proprietary database for any lawsuit participant – Plaintiff, Defendant or Attorney.

In the results, we’ll show you the full consumer litigation history of any participant, including the “docket data” (who, what, why, where, when) and – in many cases – we can even provide a copy of their actual filed lawsuits.

You can also search by phone, date range, federal/state, class action, court, statute, etc. We offer a ton of flexibility to get you the exact search result you are looking for.

The Litigant Alert Ongoing Monitoring Process


Just like our one-time batch process, but without the whole “one time” thing.

When one of your consumers files new litigation against anyone in the future, you should be the first to know. Our monitoring service can make that happen.

WebRecon can monitor your entire database (or any segment of it) for future instances of consumer litigation filed by the very consumers you are working with, right now!

It is simple to add new consumers to the watchlist, remove inactive accounts, download full reports, etc.

Best of all, we only charge you for the volume of your monitoring database – not the frequency of the searches. Search daily, weekly, every Tuesday and Friday, the 15th of each month, whatever – it is totally up to you! You won’t pay a penny more.

The Litigant Alert One-Time Batch Process


This is our flagship service. Find out why hundreds of companies won’t contact any consumers before running them through WebRecon’s Litigant Alert.

This process identifies consumers with a history of litigation quickly & easily. If they have ever filed lawsuits under FDCPA, TCPA, FCRA or similar statutes, you’ll find out here. 

WebRecon’s proprietary database is simply the most comprehensive collection of dangerous consumer litigation data in existence. 

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Litigation Context Search


This is really cool.

Our primary search engine is really designed to search for parties to litigation. Need to know more about a consumer plaintiff? That’s easy. Defendant? Check. Lawyer? No problem.

But if you need to find all 1099C lawsuits filed in July 2020… not so much.

Which is why we developed the Context Search. We have pulled out and indexed the full text from over 140k consumer lawsuits and made them available to you in a search engine, with more than 1000 new lawsuits added each month. Use it to search the text of filed litigation so you can easily identify those hard-to-define trends and cases worth following.

The Litigious Consumer Phone Scrub


Would you knowingly dial a number attached to a consumer with a history of litigation? Of course not.

But thousands of companies do just that, every single day. If you’d like to know who they are, simply review the court dockets. They are the ones getting sued the most.

Sure, you can stop dialing consumers. But your marketing and operations teams might not be too excited about that plan.

Another idea? Identify the consumers most likely to sue you, based on previous litigation histories, and just don’t call them.

Identify high-risk phones quickly & easily, before you expose yourself to unnecessary risk.

Workers Comp Scrub


Workers Comp-inspired FDCPA lawsuits are growing aggressively, particularly in Florida. Only WebRecon can tell you who in your database may have a Florida Worker’s Comp case filed that could trigger litigation against you.

You can’t stop 100% of all lawsuits, but if you collect medical in Florida and you don’t have a process in place to show the court that you have a way to check every file against the Workers Comp database, then you have lost the case before it even begins.

Knock these suits out of the park with the Workers Comp Scrub.

Our Monthly Client Newsletter with The Litigant Hotsheet


Anyone can get our guest newsletter, but only clients get the version with the Litigant Hotsheet –  identifying the most active consumer Plaintiffs filing suit in jurisdictions around the country each month. Grab a coffee, shut your door and open your database to make sure you are doing all you can to stay safe.

Individual Vendor Consumer Complaint Search


Just like Vendor Monitoring, but without the monitoring. Search any business’s history of consumer complaints (Litigation, CFPB, BBB, State AG) with the click of a button! Great for on-the-fly gut checks of the companies you do business with.

Vendor Monitoring


Through vicarious liability, you can be held accountable for the bad behavior of your vendors. If they abuse consumers, for all intents and purposes, so do you. This is a big freakin’ deal!

But fear not, friend. WebRecon can track consumer litigation, CFPB, BBB and State AG Office complaints against the companies you do business with.

When a new complaint of any kind is filed against any of the companies you are monitoring, we’ll automatically push a report out to you with all of the publicly available details so you can react accordingly and if necessary, protect your interests.

API Access


We offer two powerful APIs to businesses that communicate with consumers:

  • The primary Litigious Consumer Scrub uses a combination of name, geography (and optionally SSN) to identify consumers who have filed lawsuits in the past.
  • The Litigious Consumer Phone Scrub pulls every phone number from our proprietary database of litigants and runs your phones against ours.

These APIs allow you to check your data against our database on the fly. Clients love using this to handle risk management without missing a beat in their daily workflow.