Medicredit, a medical debt collector, is liable for violating a Colorado patient's do-not-call demand, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals said Aug. 17.
The debt collection agency was retained by Colorado Springs, Colo.-based St. Francis Medical Center to collect an outstanding debt of $14,738 from plaintiff Elizabeth Lupia for a medical procedure.
Medicredit sent a letter requesting payment to Ms. Lupia on April 25, 2018, and followed up with a phone call and voicemail. Ms. Lupia sent a letter dated May 1, 2018, back to Medicredit that disputed the outstanding debt and demanded the company stop calling her, though she welcomed written correspondence.
Medicredit received Ms. Lupia's letter via mail May 7, 2018, and inserted the letter into its system three days later, on May 10, 2018. On May 8, 2018, a day after Medicredit received the letter, the debt collector called Ms. Lupia about the bill.
Ms. Lupia then sued Medicredit in a federal district court, alleging that the company violated provisions in the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. In particular, Ms. Lupia said Medicredit violated the act by attempting to collect the debt despite receiving her written notice disputing the debt and calling her despite receiving her cease-and-desist letter.
In its defense, Medicredit claimed the call was simply a bona fide error because it would be "impossible to prevent every call that could be placed after a cease and desist letter arrives in Medicredit's P.O. box" and because it has a policy in place to log communications into its systems within three days.
The district court ruled in favor of Ms. Lupia, arguing that the bona fide error defense didn't excuse the violation. The court found that the error was unintentional, but concluded that Medicredit had "offer[ed] nothing to explain the rather substantial lapse of time between when the letter was marked received and when it was logged." According to the court, "no reasonable jury could find a procedure which inexplicably allows a three-day lag between receipt of a debtor’s dispute and logging that dispute into the system … to be reasonably adapted to prevent unauthorized contact with the debtor."
Medicredit asked the district court to reconsider its denial of the bona fide error defense, but the court denied its motion. Medicredit then appealed the court's decision.
The 10th Circuit on Aug. 17 affirmed the district court decision, agreeing that the bona fide error defense can't shield the debt collector from liability.
Access the full opinion here.