Thanks for the responses.

As a follow-up I asked my mother about the types of account. She believes when whe openned the account, it was her account and my brother was an authorized user. When the account got to more than $14,00, she called Capital One and told them to close the account and she wanted to pay it off. That was in Nov. 2000.

Some time after that, my brother call Capital One and told them he lost his card. They issued him a new card, with a new account number, added my mothers name to the account and never contacted my mother nor did they send her a new card (only my brother got a new card).

In 2005, my brother filed for bankruptcy, then my mother started getting calls from Captial One wanting her to pay the new balance.

My briother died in Apr 2008 and she stated getting calls again and they have added it to her credit report, driving her insurance rates up. She's tried contacting Capital One without resolution. Any thoughts on the best method to get this resolved. My brother had $6.32 cents in cash when he died and his clothes. Those were his total assest.

Thanks for the help.