Diversified Consumer Services is a division of Diversified Company, an Indiana corporation founded in 2007. We are a BBB (Better Business Bureau) Accredited Company with an A+ Rating. Diversified Company offers products and services of many types to consumers across the globe. To visit our corporate site, please click https://Diversified.Company which will open in a new page.  Should you ever be dissatisfied with the treatment you receive from our representatives or actions taken, please first try to resolve the matter with a supervisor here, otherwise, please feel free to contact the corporate offices.

Diversified Consumer Services is NOT a Collection Agency. That’s great news for you, because we work with consumers in different ways than you may have experienced with a Collection Agency.

If we’ve recently contacted you by phone, mail or email, it’s because a debt you owed to a creditor that remained unpaid was sold to us. What that means is that you no longer owe the original creditor because all ownership of the account and rights to collect on it were transferred to us. Diversified Consumer Services is considered your new creditor replacing your original creditor. This is an attempt to collect a debt. Any information obtained may be used for that purpose. IMPORTANT: Unless we are returning your call or have arranged a follow-up call with you, as a general rule, we DO NOT call our customers. ALL calls from us will ONLY come from 1-800-657-5785. When in doubt, HANG UP (we won’t take it personally if it was actually us calling) and call us back directly. This is a good rule of thumb in dealing with ANY company contacting you that you did not expect a call from, especially in matters of finance.

We always mail a letter before anything. We don’t even call you unless we have first sent the letter, and even then (see previous question/answer), it’s a rarity! However, if we have an email address on file for you, you may also receive an email from Diversified Company, our parent company, specifically from the billing portal contracted through Bill.com.  If you did not receive the mailed letter, it may have been returned to us by the USPS and will be sent back out to a new address when discovered. If we cannot locate you, your account may be sent to an outside collection agency immediately. If you received an email but no letter, please contact us at [email protected] with a revised mailing address.

Valid email domains for emails sent by this division of the company are @DiversifiedConsumer, @ChooseDiversified.com and @Diversified.Company.  If you are unsure that the email came directly from us (even if the email address contains one of the sites above), please email us directly at [email protected] and FORWARD the email to us that you received.  Do not reply directly to suspicious email.

We’re not in the business of twisting arms, however we have contacted you regarding a legal financial obligation, so it is definitely a good idea to get in touch with us. You can call us toll-free at 1-800-657-5785, email us at [email protected] (DO NOT email sensitive information like social security number, credit card number, bank account information, etc.! and NEVER mail cash!!) You can also visit the Online Payment Arrangements area of our site. No matter the way you get in touch with us, PLEASE do not ignore us.  If you wish to make a payment, you can simply visit Make a Payment. You will still want to contact us to make arrangements for future payments.

It isn’t our mission to bankrupt you or cause undue misery in your life. Yes, we do need to be paid, but we also understand that life happens, sometimes with a vengeance.  Working with us rather than against us will help us help you.  Our goal is to make our relationship mutually beneficial. Your benefit is a comfortable payment schedule with flexibility, and our is getting paid, of course. We are not here to judge you for not paying the bill in the past. That’s irrelevant. What we need to concentrate on now is “now” and the future.

The original creditor that extended credit to you made a business decision to sell your debt to us. This is not an uncommon practice at all. Rights to collect on your account was legally transferred to Diversified Consumer Services.

When banks, credit card companies, and other creditors such as payday loan companies do not get paid by their customers, it creates a strain financially as well as on staffing resources. They often hire a collection agency to collect the debt and give up a portion of the debt as payment for that service, or they decide to sell the debts to companies like ours.  The debt is still your legal obligation, and it is still due.  You no longer owe the original creditor nor can they accept payment for your account now. The right to collect on your account has been transferred to us. Because we are NOT a collection agency, this works to your advantage.

When a company closes its doors, it does not erase debts made by their customers. Depending on circumstances, it may be ordered as a part of corporate bankruptcy that the debt portfolio be allocated to creditors the company owed as they are collected. In other cases, the company may sell the debt in an effort to liquidate assets in order to pay their employees and/or creditors. For instance, Bob’s Discount Furniture (solely as an example) issues credit to its customers, but the portfolio is managed by Wells Fargo. If Bob’s Discount Furniture were to close its doors, you would continue to pay your debt to Wells Fargo. If Wells Fargo were to close or sell to another institution, you would then pay the new creditor. Bottom line, when a company dies, the obligations of its debtors do not die with it. Our company does not manage debt portfolios on behalf of other companies at this time, so when your account is processed through Diversified Consumer Services, it is owned by Diversified Consumer Services.

It’s important that you Make Payment Arrangements, but if you can’t do that at the moment, it’s even more important that you make a payment.  You can pay securely online, over the phone or by mailing your payment.  For more information, visit Payments.

Remember, you can make payments online 24/7. However, if your due date falls on a Sunday or holiday (that we are closed on), legally, the due date advances to our next business day. Monday through Saturday is are legal business days for us unless we are closed for a holiday. For example, if your payment is due January 1, which is also New Year’s Day, we are closed. You can still make payments online, but your account’s legal due date will be January 2, (unless January 2 is a Sunday, in which case your legal due date is January 3).

No. Remember, you can make payments online 24/7. However, if a promotional offer expiration date falls on a Sunday or holiday (that we are closed on), as a courtesy, the due date advances to our next business day. Monday through Saturday is are business days for us unless we are closed for a holiday. For example, if your offer expires January 1, which is also New Year’s Day, we are closed. You can still make payments online, but your account’s courtesy extension due date will be January 2, (unless January 2 is a Sunday, in which case your extension will move to a due date of January 3).

In rare instances, a debt may have been sold to us and been in process during a bankruptcy filing. This is easily solved by contacting us with verifiable information. If you (or someone else who is included on the account) have or had previously filed for bankruptcy, you need to notify us (or have your attorney notify us) immediately by calling toll-free at 1-800-657-5785, though sending us a message through Contact Us would be better so that we have it in writing.

Please have or send the following information:

Attorney’s name
Attorney’s phone number
Attorney’s address
Bankruptcy case number
You can also email us at [email protected] or send postal mail to:
Diversified Consumer Services
ATTN: Legal Department
6212 US Highway 6, Suite 184
Portage, IN 46368-5057

You or your attorney can also fax us at 321-256-0627.

We do not report debts to the credit bureaus ourselves AT THIS TIME. That only happens if your account ends up with an outside collection agency and the legal amount of time has passed first. We want to be sure you have an opportunity to make payment arrangements and follow them before we do anything like that. As long as you are holding true to arrangements you make, your account will remain in-house.  Additionally, on September 1, 2016 collection agencies are be required to report a full file on a monthly basis, including accounts that are open, that were paid in the last 90 days, or that require deletion or correction. What this means is, if we do turn your account over to a collection agency, there are now mandatory reporting requirements that must be followed. Prior to that date, a collection agency had more flexibility as to when an account would hit your credit reports. This was a great negotiating tool to encourage payment and/or payment arrangements, but under these new guidelines, it is disadvantageous to have a collection account on your credit report paid, unpaid, or paying on. We don’t release accounts to outside agencies until we feel we have exhausted our efforts.

Honestly, this isn’t a “frequently” asked question, but it came to us once, and the customer’s decision not to pay the debt UNLESS it first showed up on the three major credit bureau reports was such a bad decision that the customer should seriously consider suing the person that have them such horrible advice. When you go to the doctor, for example, and you later get a bill for whatever insurance didn’t cover, does that show up on your credit report? Nope, not unless you don’t pay it and it ends up a a collection agency. NOT having something on your credit report doesn’t mean the debt is suddenly not real. It’s just as real. See the above question and answer specific to recent changes to reporting requirements by collection agencies and you’ll quickly realize that taking the advice of a fool is a sure way to create headaches and worse, higher interest rates for loans, higher insurance rates, credit limits being reduced or credit accounts being closed by creditors, credit denials, even lost employment opportunities, and all the other devastating consequences that can happen when you have a COLLECTION AGENCY debt on your credit reports. The consequences are real. Don’t take our word for it; research it and you’ll realize that the fact we 1) aren’t a collection agency and 2) do not report to credit bureaus are two beneficial factors you don’t usually get. But, as we told the customer that brought this question to us, if you choose not to pay, we’ll eventually send it to a collection agency, it will soon be on your credit reports, and THEN you can pay the bill that is now “real” based on bad advice from a non-educated source of information, and we won’t be able to do anything about the fact it is on your credit reports for seven years.

Hopefully not! It’s not at all what we thirst for. There are situations that may warrant a lawsuit, and if that happens, although we can’t give you legal advice, it is in your best interest to respond. Our goal is to work with you, even if something goes wrong along the way, so that we can ultimately get the debt repaid to us and you can go on about your life. As a general rule, we do not have to go to the extreme of the court system. If your account ends up in an outside collection agency’s hands, they are pre-authorized to take any and all legal action permissible and deemed appropriate.  This does include filing a lawsuit if permissible and deemed appropriate, but in spite of this pre-authorization, we must “sign off” on any decision made to proceed with litigation.

Yes! You have rights. You have 30 days to dispute the validity of the debt from the date on the notice, otherwise, it is legally considered valid. Upon receiving your written dispute, we will send you verification of the debt, and the address of the original creditor.  If the balance shown differs from your records, please provide documentation to that effect so we may investigate it. For your convenience, you can file your dispute online at Dispute Debt Online.

When we purchase a debt portfolio, the previous owner is no longer permitted to collect on the debt. Legally, any payments you make to them have to be routed back to us by them if made after the date we purchased the portfolio that includes your account(s). There is usually more than one previous owner aside from the original creditor before it comes to us. We are provided information that is SUPPOSED to be 100% accurate, however, there are oversights that do happen with previous owners sometimes. In these cases, you need to be able to provide proof that you paid the debt or payments you made toward the debt. If there is still a balance due, you must make those payments to us, not the previous owner of the account.

If you have made payments to anyone other than our company on the account you received notice on, please contact us IMMEDIATELY and let us know the name of the company you have paid or are paying.  We will be able to determine whether or not you are the possible victim of a scam. If you are a victim, we will advise you to STOP PAYMENT on any future scheduled payments with that company and/or open a new bank account and close the affected one and/or cancel the credit card you made payment with and request a new one. We will work with your bank and/or credit card company if we can, and will assist in recovery of those funds so you can pay us, the legal owner of your account.

It is extremely rare that a second LEGITIMATE company has ownership of the same account. Simply put, human error has been known to cause the same account to be sold to more than one company.  BUT, unfortunately, rampant fraud in the credit and collection industry tends to reveal that an ILLEGITIMATE “so-called” company is illegally attempting to collect on the same account.  To date, we have not sold any debt portfolio. In the event we do in the future, we will notify our customers of that action. Please see the previous question for more information. If you get a call or letter stating that, DO NOT MAKE PAYMENT ARRANGEMENTS OR SEND PAYMENTS TO THAT COMPANY! While we will NOT advise you to ignore the letter (as it can cause problems if you do), we ask that you contact us first. We may ask you to sign an authorization to exchange information with the other creditor so we can get the account closed at their end. EVEN IF the other company purchased your account without knowledge it was already owned by us, we prevail in these matters. Anyone collecting a payment on an account we own has a legal obligation to forward those funds to us. This does NOT necessarily mean the other company is attempting a scam, but again, see previous question for more information.  BECAUSE WE HAVE THE LEGAL “CHAIN OF TITLE/BILL OF SALE” FROM THE PURCHASE OF ALL DEBT PORTFOLIOS, WE CAN VERY EASILY DETERMINE WHETHER OR NOT YOU HAVE BEEN SCAMMED OR A SCAM ATTEMPT IS IN PROGRESS.

Diversified Consumer Services created VALICATE as a fraud prevention tool that allows you to find out who has owned your account in the past, to confirm that we do own it, and what its status us. This is updated in real-time. This is a free resource. Click below or visit https://valicate.com.

There are a lot of misconceptions when it comes to how long debt collection can be pursued. Laws vary state to state on how long a debt can be pursued. Some laws are even more specific based on whether it is a credit card, payday loan, NSF fee, mortgage, and other classifications as well as whether or not a lawsuit was filed and won, and whether or not a bankruptcy qualified to discharge all or part of the debt.  There are two sure ways to make a debt noncollectable: 1) Payment in full, and 2) Discharging of the debt in Bankruptcy. Beyond those two sureties, you would need to refer to the laws of your state. Most debt such as the type we purchase will EVENTUALLY be deemed noncollectable in any way, but at what cost to you, financially and mentally?  We work with you to make it easier to get that debt paid in full without undue misery.

Just as you are unique, so is every account in our system. As we stress, we work with you to make it easier to get your debt paid in full without undue misery. That said, we reserve the right to extend an option for you to settle your account balance for a lesser amount. At any time, you reserve the right to make an offer of settlement to us. Any arrangement of this sort we make will be done in writing. We will provide you with that written information BEFORE you make the payment. Settlements are not always single payments. Various circumstances affect the time period, amount, and whether it is done in one, two or several payments. If we offer and you accept or you offer and we accept a lesser amount to settle your account, it is contingent on payment being made on time with good funds. Any deviation from the agreement will void it, and any money received will reduce your balance, but not settle it out. Certain circumstances may require us to provide a 1099-C IRS form to you during the early months of the year following a settlement. As a result, you may owe taxes on the portion of the debt that was forgiven. We will be able to determine whether or not this applies to your case, so there will be no surprises.

That’s far from the truth, actually. It is true that collection agencies are different than debt buyers and as a result are not included in some of the laws that must be followed by collection agencies, however there are many laws debt buyers still must follow.  Interestingly, debt buyers are not considered Debt Collectors under the FDCPA based on a Supreme Court ruling from June 12, 2017. We do not consider ourselves above the law, so we follow it, but just because we may not be required to comply with laws that do not apply to our specific industry category doesn’t change our approach. It is our goal to work with you harmoniously to resolve this debt. We’re not a collection agency. From the standpoint of our relationship, it is irrelevant for all intents and purposes.

This is also a case-by-case issue. First, we have to determine whether or not we can legally turn your debt over to a collection agency. Actually, first we have to determine whether or not we have exhausted our efforts to work with you. If you completely ignore us, odds are, if we can, we will. We also have to determine if legal action is permissible, and whether it is in our best interest to pursue it. We do have rights in purchasing this debt and we reserve the right to exercise or waive our rights in the best interest of the company AND/OR the customer. The best way to make this a definite NO is NOT to ignore us. Work with us and we’ll work with you. That’s a promise!

First, regardless of when you lost your loved one, our condolences for your loss. It is certainly unpleasant to receive a notice of money owed when you are grieving. As to the question, if you are a co-owner or co-signer on the account, yes, you are liable, but just like any other account, we will work with you to make the process as painless as possible. If you are NOT a co-owner or co-signer, although we may have some legal rights to pursue collection against the estate, we do not. This is an example of how we differ from a collection agency or what you may be used to from anyone contacting you about money you or a loved one owes. The process is very simple. You can call, email or mail us to advise that your loved one is no longer with us. We will need to verify some information, which you can include in your written communication or when you speak to us. Please provide as much of the following information as possible. Thanks to technology, we can often, but not always, verify this information without you needing to provide a Death Certificate. It’s good to have the following information handy, but you may not need all of it. Once we validate the information, we will send a written notice “TO THE FAMILY OF” stating that the debt has been zeroed out and to confirm that no future attempts will be made to collect the debt.

Full name as it appears on the notice
Legal name if different in any way
Account Number on the notice
Date of Birth
Date of Death
Last 4 digits of Social Security Number – This is enough information to allow us to verify this information online without needing you to send a copy of a Death Certificate. The only reasons we will reach out again about this account is 1) to confirm we have verified the information and closed out the account and/or 2) to ask for a copy of the Death Certificate if we cannot verify it online.  We appreciate your cooperation in this matter and want to be out of your hair as quickly as possible.

Yes! Just be sure the company you are working with has our information so they can send a proposal to us. We respond promptly to proposals the same as we do when coming directly from you. You will have signed an agreement with the agency allowing them to interact with your creditors, and we’ll work with them. No worries.

We can’t recommend any one company to you, however, we do suggest that you work with a NON-PROFIT agency. These companies work with you at LITTLE TO NO COST to you. They make most of their money from “Fair Share” which is the equivalent of a commission they deduct (or invoice) your creditors for, sort of like a collection fee, but it doesn’t lessen the amount you are credited for your payment. In other words, a $50 payment made by you intended to go to us will count as $50 whether or not the agency bills us for or deducts Fair Share that we agree to allow. This isn’t to say that you can’t work with a FOR profit agency, but be sure to check out ANY company thoroughly that you are allowing into your financial world. We suggest visiting the National Foundation for Credit Counseling® (NFCC®) at their website (which will open in a new window) or call them at 1-800-388-2227 to discuss your situation and put you in touch with a member organization in your area.

We do, in fact, record ALL calls from the point of connection to our system. We actually wish recording just started from the time you speak with a representative, but that’s a feature our telephone service provider has not yet implemented. So, if we were bored enough to listen to a call from its connection, we could hear anything you say while listening to menu options, being on hold, and while speaking to a representative. We do not record calls for entertainment purposes. Much like security cameras are typically only viewed by a company if an issue occurs, the same is typically true with recording calls.  Naturally, any voice mail message you leave for us is also recorded. Recordings attached to your digital internal account in our Customer Management System are limited to relevant voice mail messages you leave, verbal authorization you give us to debit your bank account or charge your credit card, or to speak to a third-party, such as an insurance company, attorney, or personal representative.  Additionally, yes, if you are belligerent to our employees, we are likely to attach the recording to your account. Recordings are retained for the time-frame appropriate to the recording itself.

You may need to refer to the previous question regarding belligerent behavior. In cases where a customer is abusive, harassing, threatening, etc. toward our employees or in a voice mail message, the call is referred to Administration for review of the recorded call. If it is determined that it is in the best interest of our company, we may elect to prohibit telephone calls from you. If this happens to you, you will receive a written communication from the President of the company notifying you of the action and the reason(s) behind it. You will then only be able to communicate with us through email or USPS mail.  Blocked calls are a permanent action, by policy. Additionally, our employees are permitted, by policy, to disconnect calls without warning in the event a customer blocked from calling calls from a different number. If you feel your number has been blocked in error, for example, possibly a phone number previously owned by another customer, please use the CONTACT US menu option on this site.

This is an interesting question, mainly because sometimes it’s easier to prove something IS easier than something IS NOT. For example, do you like broccoli? Yes? Can you prove it? No? Can you prove it? Food for thought (no pun intended): Eating broccoli does not prove you like it, it just proves you ate it. NOT eating it doesn’t prove you don’t like it, it just proves you didn’t eat it. Making a face to show your displeasure with the broccoli just proves you can make a face.  Enough of the silly (but accurate) analogy. Here’s a few things to consider:

1. MOST companies in this industry will not mail you anything if they’re scamming you. In addition to the fraud they’re already perpetrating,  they’re adding Mail Fraud into the mix which is an extremely serious crime. We mail our customers a letter before doing anything else! And we mail out hundreds at a time.  (It doesn’t PROVE we’re not a scam though. It just proves we use the USPS to communicate.)
2. MOST companies in this industry that are scamming you aren’t going to have a RESOURCES tab encouraging you to communicate with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a government agency that investigates matters of fraud, among other free consumer services. (It doesn’t PROVE we’re not a scam though. It just proves we share information on our website that may be useful.
3. LEGITIMATE companies do not leave voice mail messages with specific details of your account unless you have given them permission to do so. They also do not contact relatives and share details. (It’s legal to contact neighbors and relatives ONCE to try to locate you, but they can’t share any information about your debt.)
4. LEGITIMATE companies NEVER make threatening statements or leave threatening voice mail messages. Some examples include threatening to show up at your place of employment, threatening to call your boss and tell them you have an unpaid bill, and one of our personal “favorites”, threatening to have a warrant issued for your arrest at the end of the business day if you don’t pay X amount. (If you ever get a voice mail message like that, SAVE IT. You may have a legal claim against the company that left the message.) We should amend this slightly to say that a LEGITIMATE company will take immediate corrective action against any employee that does do any of this. In other words, legitimate companies sometimes have a rogue employee or two. Most of us can relate to that.
5. Google is a wonderful tool. Enter our phone number 1-800-657-5785 into Google and you’ll see more than one of our website pages in the search results as well as several of those websites that tell you who is calling from a certain number. We find in most cases, when a customer provides us a phone number that they had on their caller ID or were given to call, and we search it in Google, it rarely connects to the company’s website (if they even have one) and it often has many of those “who is calling me from” websites that show tons of comments about the calls being scams. Check that stuff out!!
6. Check out https://cfpb.gov and search our company (or any other company that contacted you). Side note, presently you will only find us under Diversified Company, our parent company, but nonetheless, that’s us. When the rare inquiry comes in, we respond very quickly and so far, all inquires were either a misunderstanding (because a customer thought we were calling when it was a scammer) OR because they picked the wrong “Diversified” to submit an inquiry to. You will be amazed at the detailed information you can find out about legitimate and scam companies! REPORTING MATTERS!! Being scammed? THINK you’re being scammed? FILE A COMPLAINT and let the company do the rest. Yes, even if that’s our company you want to file a complaint against. WE HAVE NOTHING TO HIDE! (Note: Even a company with numerous resolved complaints is NOT NECESSARILY a legitimate company. It just means they address complaints quickly. You should more be looking for a pattern of behavior and complaints.)
7.  The good ol’ BBB… Better Business Bureau. This information was added March 19, 2018, updated March 27, 2018. In our near ELEVEN years in business, the BBB has received NO complaints about this or any other division of our company. As a result, you could search for our company and not even find us. We’re fixed that. (The being able to find us part, that is.) We requested that the BBB list our company, which can be confirmed at THIS LINK.  On March 19, 2018, we applied for BBB Accreditation, which was awarded on March 23, 2018.  BUT, in the interest of full disclosure, once again, this DOES NOT PROVE that we are not scamming you. (We’re not, but we’re making a point here.) Granted, accreditation is proof that the BBB believes we are a legitimate company, BUT, there are companies listed with the BBB (typically not accredited, but sometimes are and the status hasn’t been revoked) that ARE in fact scamming, or went from a legitimate company to a scammer. Much like the CFBP, look for the behavior and patterns of complaints. Some of the most legitimate companies may have HUNDREDS of complaints flow in. The bigger you are, the more likely it is to happen, especially in the financial world. BUT legitimate companies, address these matters, and the pattern where the CONSUMER has accepted the resolution is a pattern to look for. The BBB, if it receives validated information, may also report governmental actions against a company. The BBB, who is not paying us to say this, is an AWESOME resource for the consumer. It’s a great place to check to protect yourself or to complain about a company you feel has done you wrong.

Now, these are just some tips for you to be aware of. A customer recently commented that we MUST be a legitimate company because of the professionalism of our letters, website, other forms, and overall demeanor. Believe it or not, in addition to thanking the customer for the compliment, here’s what else we had to say: We’ve seen and heard some calls, documents, and tactics used by scammers, and often times even the forms they use are lazily designed and even contain spelling errors, in one case, of their own website address!  One could say that a GOOD scammer (good, defined as a successful scammer, not a good company) should take the time to do everything our customer complimented us for. It’s not rocket science to make a website look pretty and make it functional. It’s also not the early 1980’s where a typesetter was commonly hired to design forms. Microsoft Word® is a wonderful program making it possible to design some awesome forms. All that said, YES, we are a legitimate company, BUT, it’s not because we have a pretty and functional website and professional forms. It’s because WE RUN A LEGITIMATE COMPANY, and we work hard to maintain our standards and exceed customer expectations day in, day out. So the proof… the proof that we are not a scam… After reading all that, it still boils down to YOUR opinion and OUR actions. Hold us to high standards! Actually, you’ll find you don’t have to. We hold ourselves there already. So, basically, to that customer, we said, thank you for the compliments, however TRUST, but VERIFY.

We do not generally purchase debt directly from a creditor. You should contact a Debt Broker or Debt Buyer that does. We recommend selecting a Debt Broker in order to place some safeguards between the buyer and seller.

No. We are not a Debt Seller. You should contact a Debt Seller that does. We recommend selecting a Debt Broker in order to place some safeguards between the buyer and seller.

Diversified Consumer Services is NOT a Collection Agency. Therefore, we cannot collect debts owned by other creditors unless the debt was originated by our own customers, customers owing debt to companies we purchase, or customers owing debt that we purchase. You will want to seek the services of a collection agency.

Yes! Please visit the following areas of the site which will cover pretty much everything else. If not, please contact us!

Terms
Refund Policy
Privacy Policy