| Comment Number: | 527026-00007 |
| Received: | 3/6/2007 11:34:18 AM |
| Organization: | Personal |
| Commenter: | Bryan Williamson |
| State: | FL |
| Agency: | Federal Trade Commission |
| Rule: | Proof Positive: New Directions for ID Authentication |
| No Attachments |
Comments:
My wife was involved in an identity theft from DirecTV. DirecTV refused to cooperate with Florida Consumer Services and my wife for almost a year so I decided to start filing aiding and abetting against DirecTV. This got their attention very quickly. The facts are that DirecTV cannot drill holes into consumer homes without something in writting giving them authorization to do so. My wife requested for DirecTV to provide the document showing her signature and ID authorizing DirecTV to install cable at the house in question. DirecTV refused provide such document to us or the Florida Consumer Services which would have clear her credit immediately. Since DirecTV took this position they basically admitted that they were aiding and abetting a crime since they had the only document that proved otherwise. It seemed to work well for us so far since DirecTV is now cooperating. I think your task force should look at the real issue. Consumers should not be the ones who are required to prove their innocence first rather it should be the companies who should first attempt to prove that it was not the consumer (especially if they have documentation which could prove otherwise). Of course companies such as DirecTV do not want to take a direct loss on such accounts even if it was from an ID theft. DirecTV knew that eventually this credit problem would affect us personally because it would have increased the interest rates on my wife's current credit cards and even could affect how we buy a house. The end result is that DirecTV knows that over time we would get stuck with paying the debt in order to clear the credit problem which should be illegal in itself.