00:01Diane Walker is an 81-year-old woman who was involved in a minor car crash just before
00:07Christmas. The other driver basically swerved into her lane and their mirrors touched and
00:13they pulled over and exchanged details. And about a week later, the other car's insurer,
00:18Amy, which is part of the Suncorp Insurance Group, contacted Ms Walker looking to recover costs.
00:26But when she pushed back and said, well, can you provide me some evidence, Suncorp then engaged its
00:33debt collector agency, Armour Group, who spent the next four months sending really intimidating,
00:40threatening legal letters to both Ms Walker and her son, Scott Walker, who stepped in as her
00:47representative and used language like, you have been found liable, you could risk court fees as
00:55well. And initially they sent a debt collection notice of nearly $1,200, which was then increased
01:02to $1,400 without any sort of explanation, before Scott Walker then got his own debt collection
01:08notice, despite not being involved in the crash at all. Now, after about four months of this,
01:15Suncorp dropped the case because of a lack of evidence and admitted that they engaged Armour
01:21prematurely, Ms Walker got a $1,500 goodwill payment for the distress caused. But she said
01:29that the situation could have been incredibly different if her son hadn't have been involved.
01:35I probably would have just given them my insurance details or paid whatever they asked
01:40me to do. Just worrying, it's in the back of your mind all the time. I was quite relieved when
01:45I did get a
01:46letter to say that it's been completed. The legal experts that I've spoken to are quite appalled in
01:54this conduct from Armour Group. Armour's processes are automated. They say on their website that they
02:01are AI driven and that it can take less than two minutes to set up a smart payment plan workflow
02:09with no
02:10manual intervention required. And the former chair of the ACCC, Alan Fell, says this represents
02:19RoboDebt 2.0, which led to a Royal Commission back in 2022 for similar sort of automation processes.
02:26And he said this conduct is the worst kind of bullying. Also, the chief executive of the Consumer
02:34Action Law Centre, Steph Tonkin says it's concerning when automation is involved without proper oversight
02:41because often people who are receiving a debt collection notice, if it is valid in the first
02:46place, are normally quite vulnerable. It appears automated decision making has been used with little
02:53or no, frankly, oversight or checks and balances in place. Now, if Armour Group, one of the very large
03:01debt collection agencies is using these kinds of processes, we can be sure that many other debt
03:07collection companies are also using similar practices and technology. I am really worried about
03:15the future of this industry and the lack of consumer-centred design and the lack of safeguards
03:25that businesses are putting in to ensure that consumers aren't harmed.
03:30Diane Walker is one of potentially thousands of Australians who have been misled by Armour Group.
03:38In June, the ACCC announced it is taking legal action against Armour Group and another company
03:44called Force Legal, who are both owned by Credit Clear Limited. And the ACCC is alleging that between
03:51them they sent 320,000 misleading debt collection notices, allegedly misleading debt collection notices.
03:59And it's still before the courts. The next hearing is in October, but that was sparked because of
04:04complaints that had come through to the ACCC. And so we'll have to wait and see what happens there.
04:10To be honest, 1CC is a classic.
04:10And you can watch a series of conversations with regards to the ACCC.
04:11First, you can see multiple practices, this is a new kind of example.
04:11You can see what happens on the ACCC, and you can see there's a new part of the ACCC.
04:12And you can see that a new part of the ACCC.
04:12So even though you can see the ACCC, and you can see that you can see it, you can see
04:12it or something
