Consumer complaint received 01/15/2017 about Debt collection (Medical) with Phoenix Financial Services LLC (NJ).
Issue: Cont'd attempts collect debt not owed
Sub-issue: Debt was paid

Complaint: I have already submitted a complaint against Phoenix Financial Services, LLC with the CFPB. After the CFPB complaint was reviewed, the collection was removed from all three of my credit reports. This was six or seven months ago. A few days ago, I received yet another letter from Phoenix Financial Services, attempting to collect the same debt. It is now showing as a derogatory mark on my credit report again, reporting under a different account number. The original account number is XXXX. The new account number is XXXX. The original CFPB complaint was case number : XXXX. Here is a copy : " In XX/XX/XXXX, I received a notice from Phoenix Financial Services that I had an account with XXXX in collections for {$65.00}. In XX/XX/XXXX, I had paid my bill to XXXX. The company subsequently refunded the payment I made, as my insurance had covered the {$65.00} bill. 

I contacted Phoenix Financial Services with the telephone number on the letter I got int he mail. I explained to them the situation. I had both receipts from the payment and the refund. I asked them if there was a way to submit this paperwork. The representative gave me an email address and reference number to send the paperwork to them. I did, and waited a number of weeks to hear back from them. I had not heard anything. I called them a second time, and they claimed that they received my documents but now they had to contact the original creditor. I thought that was reasonable. A few weeks later, I called again. They claimed that they still had not been able to contact the original company. 

A few weeks ago, I called back again. They informed me a second time that they have not been able to contact the original company. I explained that this account was negatively affecting my otherwise clean credit report. It is an inconvenience, as this situation could not be handled in any sort of swift manner. The representative assured me that since it is being disputed, it would be off my credit report. 

I called back earlier in XXXX, as I saw the collections was still on all three of my credit reports. The representative told me it was because they usually update once a month, and I should see that they are not there within a few days because it had not been exactly a month since they deleted the information off of my credit report. 

I checked my credit report last week, and the collections are still there. I do not believe that Phoenix Financial Services has contacted the credit bureaus or the original company on my behalf, despite claiming that they are looking into my dispute. 

I 've called Phoenix Financial Services numerous times, and they are not able to make any progress with my dispute. It does not seem like they 've made any effort to even explore the validity of my dispute. I have done everything correctly and everything that they requested for me to do on my end. However, whenever I call them, it seems to me that I get a different excuse from the representative on the line. '' The company continues to attempt to collect this debt, which I have already paid. The company also attempts to yet again collect this debt, after I had already filed a CFPB complaint against the debt and it was determined that it should be removed from my credit reports. They simply created a new account number for the same amount.

Company public response: Company believes complaint caused principally by actions of third party outside the control or direction of the company
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation