Complaint Review: american trucker's legal association - tacoma Washington

After filing this rip off report, my husband received a letter from Gail Milam of ATLA.  The whole tone ofher reply was hateful, rude and condescending.  She led off with pointing out they are receiving the complaint three years later.  She is in error, because I have handled correspondence for my husband regarding this matter and they not only were sent the proper request to terminate his membership, but several follow ups over this 3 years.  Ms. Milam seemed to nit pick on some of the incidental remarks made in my husband's complaint...the 2nd attorney who never notified us or returned calls...that was not the complaint...the point was with this attorney not following up on matters, I was forced to call ATLA to get information about the case, which they always were able to give us...yet, now she wants to say that there has NEVER BEEN ANY CONTACT BETWEEN US AND THEIR OFFICE!!!  WTF lady!!!  You either had an employee that never logged a phone call or you purged your records after a certain amount of time...there was PLENTY of contact with ATLA...I made the calls, I know for a fact we talked to you guys  A LOT!!!!!  But... THAT IS NOT THE POINT! 

THE POINT IS THIS:  WE FOLLOWED PROPER PROCEDURE TO TERMINATE THE AGREEMENT...WE SENT IT TO THEM IN WRITING...ALL CASES INVOLVING MY HUSBAND WERE RESOLVED, SO NOTHING WAS OUTSTANDING...ATLA CLAIMS THEY NEVER GOT IT...WHAT MAKES THEM RIGHT AND US WRONG?  DUE TO WATER DAMAGE OF  PAPERWORK IN OUR STORAGE , WE DON'T HAVE A COPY OF THE LETTER SENT TO THEM IN EARLY 2008...But on the other hand, they cannot prove they DIDN'T receive it either!   Who gets to decide that they are right and we are wrong...or liars or what ever she was implying by the following excerpt.

Ms. Milam stated in her letter:
If you believe that any attorney did not represent you properly, you have every right to complain to that attorney or complain to the respective bar association.We note , however,you made no  telephone calls to our office complaining of these matters.  Regardless, your membership dues commitment is not tied to the outcome of any court case,or your unhappiness with any attorney. It is a separate commitment.  ATLA does care about the member-attorney relationship, however.  No complaint was ever received here from you.

We never tied the membership dues committment to the irritation with the 2nd attorney!  She is saying we never contacted or complained to their office...SHE is the liar...or she had a disgruntled employee either not log the many phone calls  regarding the lawyer and his refusal to ever call us back...that he was nothing more than a message on an answering machine in Bakersfield, Ca.  I made the majority of the calls and talked to the really nice guy I always talked to  and because of Cancer Chemo brain, I cannot remember his name...I want to say either Rick or Terry...I always talked to the same fellow and he was nice, helpful, and would get right back to me with an answer.  We had no complaint really, because the ATLA guy was a doll and helped out!  I was floored to read her telling me there was no record of any communications!!!!!

Finally she had to add insult to injury with this statement:

The Board has made the determination that without ATLA actually having received your written cancellation, your account could not be cancelled and your dues rightfully accrued.  All cancellations must be written,and via that procedure, you do have the choice to stop; but you must initiate it. 

Here's the really snarky remark:
Be advised that when you join a membership, it is your responsibility to read, and adhere to the policy sent to you.  We do show in our billing records that you received a warning about your account being flagged for outside collection on 5/12/08, 6/12/08, and 7/11/08 in your monthly billing  statement.  In August 2008, ATLA terminated your account, and still gave you some time to respond.  You remained silent.

SERIOUSLY LADY?!?!?
#1. You made a serious mistake mouthing off there...The statement printout you attached to your hateful letter states the billing dates to be on the 1st of the month each month, so where did the12 th come from all of a sudden?  You don't even know when you did or didn't send out those notices...and  #2. I was tired of writing you notes and mailing back all the statements by then!  I thought you had just finally took the hint and closed the account!!!!!  When you FINALLY went silent, do you seriously think I  was going to contact you??? 

And the Grand Finale...Did you really think it would intimidate or worry me or my husband...

...in November 2008, Crowne One Network, Inc. was sent your delinquent balance.  They are a premier collections agency;that is why ATLA forwards uncollected accounts to them.  They are highly effective and persistant.

To that all I can say is LMAO!  They only responded to us one time and all they did was send a copy of the print out from your records showing we owed all those months that  WE CANCELLED!  No letter, note, just a copy...I had already told them ATLA did not cancel us when they should have.  They have not tried to contact us again...that was in April 2008! And a "premier" collection agency...I DON'T THINK SO...THEY NOT ONLY HAVE NOT BEEN PERSISTANT, BUT  THEY ARE IN THESE RIP-OFF REPORTS TOO...FOR DOING TO PEOPLE ON BEHALF OF OTHER COMPANIES THE VERY THING YOU AND THEY ARE DOING TO US NOW...One report even shed light on an account they had lost, but continued to bill and collect monies on behalf of them!  They ripped off the business and the consumer both!!  You all are all crooks!!!!!!! 

The whole tone of Ms. Milam's letter was NOT from a legitimate business concerned with the welfare of truckers ...it sounded like an Old Maid school teacher reprimanding  a child!  She could have been a big girl and come right out and called us liars...I am a big enough girl to tell her she is either in total denial of some wrong doing by employees that never logged any communications with us,or  she is on a power kick and pissing to mark her territory, or she is just a crooked unscrupulous person ripping off truckers if they will continue to pay dues after cancellation to avoid problems!!!!!

Whatever her motives are she could at least pretend to be a trucker's friend and a good old fashioned  AMERICAN BUSINESS PERSON and say "There has been a total breakdown of communication...my fault, your fault, nobody's fault...At the end of the day, you folks didn't owe us for any services performed...let's call it even and every body go home happy tonight."  Its the RIGHT thing to do, the AMERICAN BUSINESS ETHIC that this country was built on!  I was in management and customer service for an international shipping company for 10 years...we might lose a customer, but we made every effort to make sure they walked away and didn't have a bitter taste in their mouth for anything we did or didn't do for them.  Once again I apologize for any lapse in our communications...such as just now being able to respond to your letter which came in the middle of January...My husband is on the wheel of a truck, trying to eak out a living for us since I am totally disabled from Stage 3 cancer, and the fact that we have lost so much...my health, my ability to work, a couple of homes along this journey, and since June of 2011, we have suffered the illness and deaths of 9 family members. We have been devastated just about every way known to mankind  the past year...we're not asking for something that's going to cost  anybody anything...just what's right.  If ATLA is going to be so rigid as to stand on the premise that we didn't do  what we were supposed to do...I guess we will just chalk it up to experience because we know that  WE DID DO THE RIGHT THING, THE RIGHT WAY!  And your little piddly $346.50 amount you are so rigidly insisting on will not make or break us.  It won't even pay for one doctor visit for me...but it will cost you in ways you will never know.  We are  3rd generation truckers,  we have a lot of family and friends and friends of friends.  People listen to men like my husband because he has been on the road for over 30 years and has the experience and perfect safety record to show for it...there are lots and lots of folks we could recommend your business to...a lot of $38.50's every month.  They in turn, will tell others of our horrible experience and so on and so on.  Given the  fact that we are not the first ones to be crapped on by you and Crowne One, and probably won't be the last, you stand to lose much more than we ever will.  Your blemish on my husband's credit will go away sooner or later (and we do intend to put comments on credit reporting agencies to explain what you have done to us)...but the bad taste in our moths when we tell people about ATLA will never go away.  Good luck to you...Karma's a b***h Ms. Milam...and so are you!

   The hard a*s in me wants to say stop getting tickets,but your off the road so that problem is solved.

   But the good side to this story and I'm sure it won't give you much comfort or satisfaction.That these people that put everyone in credit reporting agencies and DAC are just cutting there own throats,more so when you have a place to complain about them such as ROR.These kind of things are happening to so many people,that eventually they will start losing business big time.Just like DAC,they have put so many people out of work because they except lies from trucking companies that keep drivers from getting another job.I think that is all starting to come back on them already.If your a trucking company looking for a driver and you check his DAC report and they see a trucking company that has said bad things about others,then they are going to start wondering who's doing the lieing,and of course most of them know already.Same thing with credit reporting,they have so many people in there that they don't know who to give credit to anymore,so where does that leave them?Joining anything on the internet is nothing more than a disaster waiting to happen,you always have to jump thru hoops to get out of it.

Just for the record I have had more than my share of tickets and I can not ever remember getting one I didn't deserve,so I just payed it and went on my way,I'm still here it wasn't that big of deal.

I wish you and your wife nothing but the best and God Bless.

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Marty