Columbia Credit Services Collection Agency Sued By San Francisco

The city of San Francisco has sued the collection agency Columbia Credit Services Inc., the National Arbitration Forum, and FIA Card Services alleging unfair and unlawful business practices.

The filing charges that the National Arbitration Forum is an “arbitration mill, churning out arbitration awards in favor of debt collectors and against California consumers.”

FIA issues credit cards to California consumers and Columbia Credit is a debt purchaser and collection agency based in Sacramento, Calif. The suit charges FIA and Columbia with participating in NAF’s “sham by forcing consumers into the NAF forum which they know to be biased in their favor.” The suit also charges Columbia with seeking attorney fees from consumers that lose an NAF arbitrated suit, “an unlawful business practice” that abets NAF’s activities.

The law suit found there were 33,933 consumer arbitration hearings in California involving consumer collections from January 2003 though March 2007. Of these, only 30 resulted in favor of the consumer.

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