CBCS Collection Agency Possible Ripoff? Not sure. Columbus Ohio

I received a letter in the mail a few days ago from a collection agency. they were letting me know that supposedly I owe Bellsouth in South Carolina $159 and some change from October of '04. I was certain this had to be a mistake, since the only phone service I had back then was through SBC specifically, not BellSouth, and it most certainly was not in south Carolina.

So I called the number on the letter, and got a hold of a rep. He immediately started asking me for phone numbers, addresses, and card numbers. I told him, no, that was not the reason I was calling, that the reason I was calling is because this is not a valid debt, as I always paid my phone bill on time. As I was explaining this to the young man, he promptly hung up on me.

I called back a bit later, slightly miffed at the whole situation, and got a lady by the name of Trina. She was perfectly nice while attempting to extract information from me, but when I attempted to explain to her that there is no way that I owed that money, had never received that bill, and refused to pay it since there was no proof that I owed it, she became very belligerent and demanded that I pay NOW. She told me that if I had never received a bill for that amount, then how would I know if I owed it or not?

She demanded that I send a receipt showing the bill paid or pay them NOW. I told her there was no recept for that bill because there is NO BILL. She continued to argue and then hung up on me.

Now, what kind of collection agency argues with consumers? I have dealt with a few of them and rarely are any of them that rude. It's not wise to cop an attitude with someone you want money from.

Afterward, I was quite angry. I proceeded to call BellSouth South Carolina and they told me that they have no record of it, to call SBC since my phone service had been through them at that time (I no longer deal with SBC).

I called SBC and they also had no record of any debt. Then I decided, what the heck, I will do some research on this company. BBB had CBCS listed as unsatisfactory. Then I checked out this site and discovered even more information on them. So by this time I was about 95% certain that this company and/or debt was bogus, fraudulent, phony, all of the above.

At the suggestion of a friend of mine, I went back and looked at the letter. Unlike other such notices I have received in the past, there is no such customer code (typical of SBC) or, as would be typical of a collection relating to a phone bill, phone number. The account number on the letter does not match my SBC account, and since BellSouth knows not who I am, it doesn't match theirs either. Then there is the little matter of this place being in South Carolina and me being in Missouri. The last time I was in South Carolina was back in June of '03. The return address is also to BellSouth. All in all, it looks odd. I don't buy it and I'm not paying it.

Lilah
KANSAS CITY, Missouri
U.S.A.