Class Action Claims Penn. Higher Education Assistance Agency ‘Secretly’ Records Phone Conversations Without Consent

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A proposed class action claims the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency (PHEAA) has overstepped a California privacy law by “secretly” recording calls without informing those on the other end of the line.

The 15-case relays that the California Penal Code prohibits the unauthorized recording of phone calls that involve “confidential information,” or any call involving a cellular or cordless telephone, without the consent of both parties to the conversation. The suit alleges the PHEAA has failed to inform consumers at the outset of outgoing phone calls that the call is being recorded, as required under state law.

“When placing a call, the first thing Defendant should say is that the call is recorded, but it does not,” the complaint states.

The plaintiff, a California resident, says the defendant placed a call to his cell phone in January 2021 in an attempt to collect an alleged student loan debt. After “some small talk,” the defendant’s agent asked for the plaintiff’s full name and date of birth, according to the case, and then went on to discuss “specific information” about the plaintiff’s account and payment history.

The plaintiff says he then asked if the defendant was recording the call and was told that it was being recorded, after which the man “was upset that Defendant recorded Plaintiff’s private conversation without telling him” and hung up, the lawsuit states.

According to the case, PHEAA failed to inform the plaintiff at the outset of the call that it was being recorded and “at no point” received his consent to record the call.

“Nonetheless,” the complaint says, “Defendant was in fact surreptitiously recording the entirety of the approximately one-minute-long conversation between Plaintiff and Defendant.”

The plaintiff says he was “troubled and distressed” by the recording of a telephone conversation wherein he provided personal information without being informed that the call was being recorded.

Per the case, the disclosure of call recording is, as a matter of the defendant’s policy, not included in the script used to interact with consumers during outbound phone calls. The lawsuit claims the defendant violated the plaintiff’s “constitutionally protected privacy rights” and owes him and proposed class members statutory damages of $5,000 per violation.

The suit looks to represent anyone in California with a debt with the defendant whose conversations were recorded without their consent by PHEAA or its agents within the past year, as well as a proposed subclass of California consumers whose cellular telephone conversations were recorded without their consent by the defendant or its agents within the past year.

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