[Solved] Afterpay - Debt Collection

7effect on 29/01/2019 - 14:52
Last edited 29/01/2019 - 16:18 by 1 other user

Anyone else receiving emails from debt collection agencies acting on behalf of Afterpay? I've never used Afterpay before but this is the second time in 6 months I've received an email requesting payment for funds owing. I assume people are setting up fake accounts, purchasing items, and then never paying.

The latest email:

Dear Bailey,

RE: Afterpay Account

Amount Due as at 29JAN2019 : $404
Outstanding arrears amount - $404

Collection House Limited ("Collection House") acts for Afterpay as its duly authorised commercial agent.

We note that you have not responded to our previous correspondence and as of today the outstanding balance remains unpaid.

If you are having financial difficulties, we are prepared to discuss an alternative payment arrangement to clear the outstanding balance.

Please contact this office as soon as possible or log in to your CLH portal via: www.CLH.com.au to make full payment or to set up a payment plan.

Regards

Collection House Limited

Our Ref: 40130225676

Phone: 1800 617 899

Email: [email protected]

Financial

Related Stores

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Comments

  • Hybroid on 29/01/2019 - 14:53
    +15

    Could be a scam. Contact Afterpay to confirm.

  • HighAndDry on 29/01/2019 - 14:56
    +11

    I wouldn't contact anyone - as Hybroid says, could well be a scammer completely unrelated to Afterpay. Or it could be someone using your email to sign up for it. If you've never used Afterpay, I'd ignore it. Oh and, don't click on any links in any emails from unknown senders.

    Edit: Com'on, do people really go follow up every spam email they get? This is standard spam. Anything actually serious will always be followed up with physical (99% registered) mail. It's completely risk-free to ignore this spam.

  • John Kimble on 29/01/2019 - 15:04
    +2

    www.clh.com.au has nothing to do with collection house it seems?

  • chumlee on 29/01/2019 - 15:16

    I'm sure Afterpay doesn't sell it's debts to 3rd parties and just writes them off after a period of time and suspends your account.

    • 7effect on 29/01/2019 - 15:18
      +1

      Good point. As i mentioned this is the second time i've received an email regarding Afterpay despite never opening an acocunt. However the first time was from afterpay itself, and they simply suspended the account:

      Afterpay Team (Afterpay)

      24 Sep., 16:49 AEST
      This is to let you know that your Afterpay Account has been Suspended as a result of Banking Disputes for one or more of your payments.

      Please contact us ASAP to discuss resolving this situation:

      Australia 1300 100 729

      8am to 7.30pm Mon to Fri

      Sat 9-5pm

      Act Quickly!

      To resolve this, the card holder will need to contact the bank to confirm that they recognise the transaction/s and cancel the dispute.

      Then you need to provide Afterpay with a copy of the withdrawal reference number - once we have received this we can review the status of your account.

      Too late to remove the dispute?

      If the bank has already returned the funds to your card it will be too late for the card holder to cancel the dispute and you will need to repay the disputed amounts directly to Afterpay.

      You will not have any access to your account whilst this dispute is open:

      Automated payment will stop
Late fees may apply
Your account may be handed to a third party agency
You will not be able to shop

      Regards,
      Afterpay Team

    • malich on 29/01/2019 - 16:36
      +2

      I'm 90% sure they do sell off the debt. I recall one of the sob stories (somebody who borrowed without any capacity to pay) complaining that they were getting chased by debt collection agencies.

      I'm sure as a publically listed company their investors would demand that the debts be sold off rather than writing them off completely.

      • dec1an on 30/01/2019 - 11:45

        Yup. There are big markets in debt - remember the whole housing crash in the USA?

  • 7effect on 29/01/2019 - 15:20
    +1

    I'm not sure why they don't ask for email verification first. Would save a lot of hassle.
    Anyway, thanks everyone for your replies.

  • CyberMurning on 29/01/2019 - 15:25
    +1

    by the way how this afterpay works, can someone without job buy/take some clothes and pay installments in xx months?
    that would be disasters then. i supposed no credit check are done too?

    • sghetti on 29/01/2019 - 15:51
      +1

      I'm pretty sure a basic credit check is done on your credit file. If your credit score is below the threshold you'll probably be rejected on signup.

      Take it with a grain of salt as I'm not sure how believable it is. But the AfterPay founders claimed that late payment or no payment of debts are not a profit driver for their company, the fees they charge to recover funds are reflective of the costs of recovery.

      Their bread and butter is charging their fees to retailers to who offer the AfterPay service. It's crazy how quickly these services have taken off in recent times.

      • Artkin on 30/01/2019 - 09:24

        No credit check, hence no need for afterpay to sign up with external dispute service which reintroduces credit license style requirements. Afterpay is keen to retain an unregulated product. Only checks they do are id, through the electroral roll. Would guess that fraud risk is a major concern for them and identity theft is a real possibility. I'd call and refute that the service was used. Since they are not registered for external debt resolution they cant impact your credit file (they havr no access to it)

    • AustriaBargain on 29/01/2019 - 15:57

      It's only a $1000 line of credit. I think it starts off at $250 for new accounts. Not exactly high risk amounts for a company as successful as Afterpay, they made something like 28 million dollars in late fees alone last year, plus the merchant fees on top of that.

      I think it could be a good introduction to credit for people without jobs, it's fairly low risk amounts for them as well. Afterpay could let you buy rich man's boots that will last for years, instead of buying poor man's boots every few months. Or useless stuff they don't need. and they may overpay and miss out on bargains, but most people miss out on bargains anyway. They like the convenience of just going out and buying something without overthinking it.

      • CyberMurning on 29/01/2019 - 17:09

        i think not.
        before you buy anything you need to make sure you have money for it.
        i never understand people borrow money to buy clothes, phone etc. come on!

        • bobbified on 29/01/2019 - 19:41
          +1

          i never understand people borrow money to buy clothes, phone etc. come on

          Buying a phone on a contract is "borrowing". I do it for tax/cashflow purposes. "Borrowng" isn't always a bad thing.

          • ronnknee on 29/01/2019 - 20:43

            @bobbified: I think ChiMot's point is that one should have the means to pay off something before buying instead of plainly borrowing out of necessity.

            It's the same with credit cards. I'm sure you and I are wise enough not to spend more than what we can afford but we still spend on credit card to get points etc. whereas others would spend their entire credit limit without the ability to pay it off.

    • chumlee on 29/01/2019 - 16:22

      No credit check is done as they are not a credit provider.

      • malich on 29/01/2019 - 16:33

        Even credit providers don't have to run credit checks. There's many, especially those lending around the same figures that afterpay advances, that don't bother running them for commercial reasons.

        • chumlee on 29/01/2019 - 16:43

          Yeah but they have to follow responsible lending practices whereas buy now pay later schemes don't need to

          • malich on 29/01/2019 - 17:56

            @chumlee: Yeah which is a little ridiculous imo.

            Advocates for the model propose that it should be buyer beware.. but lending hasn't operated that way for decades.

            In any case, I'm sure asic will force APT into a compromise. They may go down the route of zippay and force a scrape of bank statements to demonstrate capacity to pay.

  • [Deactivated] on 29/01/2019 - 15:49

    Did they correctly specify you name in the letter, or anything about your identification?
    This is a good hint.
    Apart from your first post, did Afterpay start with "Dear User" or is the email from afterpay something different?
    The fact they created urgency in the email also suggest a scam.

    • 7effect on 29/01/2019 - 16:36

      Both Afterpay and the debt collection agency did not identify me. Afterpay addressed the email to 'Awach Gombek' and the latter addressed the email simply to 'Bailey'.

  • Sage on 29/01/2019 - 15:50
    +1

    Got it too today.

  • AustriaBargain on 29/01/2019 - 15:54
    -1

    Afterpay is so common now that it's probably a scam. Walking down the city mall it feels like 9/10 shops now have an Afterpay sticker on their windows. So odds are good that any particular person will have an account. I'd give it to Afterpay and forget about it. Create your own account with Afterpay with a strong password.

    Its good to know you guys without after pay are getting these letters, makes me think Afterpay's contact database wasn't hacked.

  • Topdog on 29/01/2019 - 15:54
    +1

    The Website has no where to login and also does not have have a signed security certificate. im calling BS scam

    • CtrlAltSpoods on 30/01/2019 - 13:12
      +1

      It comes up as a web hosting company for me? :/

      Nothing to do with Debt Collection..

  • JIMB0 on 30/01/2019 - 09:39
    +2

    Can you pay with iTunes cards?

  • backpaqer on 30/01/2019 - 14:46

    If you think about it, if you opened up an afterpay account you would need to verify your email address initially to be able to use the app. When you first start using it I hear they limit credit available.

    Sounds scammy to me.

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