How ironic.
A former debt collector finds himself on the receiving end of collection activity. Don’t you just love the irony of it all?
Jay Jones, former executive vice president of defunct debt buyer Commercial Financial Services Inc. (CFS), owes approximately $2.6 million to the state of Oklahoma, according to the Oklahoma Tax Commission (OTC) which recently began posting outstanding tax warrants online.
CFS, which was based in Tulsa, filed bankruptcy in 1998, putting 3,600 employees out of work. Quite a few of those employees were friends and acquaintances of mine.
The circumstances surrounding CFS’s implosion led to a federal grand jury indictment of Jones and Bill Bartmann, the company’s CEO. The men were accused of creating a shell company, Dimat Corp., to inflate the performance of CFS.
Bartmann was acquitted but Jones pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge and was sentenced to five years in prison. Federal Bureau of Prisons records show he was released in 2007.
In 2008, the OTC – with a hint of irony – hired a collection agency to get the unpaid taxes from Jones.
Jones is listed as one of Oklahoma’s top ten delinquent taxpayers. All have had tax liens filed against them according to a spokesperson with the OTC.
Unlike other tax information, tax liens are public record. Individuals and businesses who can not or do not pay are given many opportunities to work out agreements with the OTC. Often, the unpaid taxes are turned over to collectors. After attempts at settling the debts fail, the OTC will file a tax lien in the county where the business or individual resides.
The OTC sends out a letter 90 days before the information goes online. Penalties depend on the type of debt and interest accrues at a rate of 15% annually according to Paula Ross, spokesperson for the OTC.
Source: PaymentsSource.com
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
CFS has interested me for years. Back in 2007, it was #6 on the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing companies. The CEO, Bill Bartmann, was chronicled in an Inc. cover story titled, “The Billionaire Nobody Knows.” His business partner was convicted of fraud, though Bartmann was acquitted.
The company’s bankruptcy was fascinating because the records revealed so many documents in connection with the debt buying industry and how it worked at the time. I, along with some of my colleagues, have pored over the court records for hundreds of hours and treated it as spectacular CLE.
Now he’s written a book about the bank bailouts, apparently created a university in Tulsa, and has remade himself into something of a financial guru.
It’s an interesting story that has gone on for a decade. Thanks for the post.
I worked at CFS and in case you aren’t aware, Bill Bartmann is not professional, ethical, or successful. He is definitely not a guru unless you define guru as a business leader who takes the stage at a company meeting and says, “You are all a bunch of goats f***ing each other in the a**.” I attended this meeting and witnessed his depravity with my own eyes and ears.
CFS was located in a building formerly owned by Oral Roberts University. Bill Bartmann has never “created a university”. That endeavor requires integrity and Bill Bartmann has none.
Tracy is exactly right! Bill is not an credible individual to say the very least – he is a wolf in sheeps clothing (just barely) – he is handicapped both mentally and physically. His lack of tact and management abilities only contributes to his ignorance.