Went to court 2/3/10 with Portfolio CC with no lawyer, just me and the fact I have no ability to pay off $12k. Approach the judge and a Portfolio lawyer steps up, says there is a continuance. Judge says why, lawyer says a settlement has been made/offered.

I tell the judge it's a surprise to me. Judge says she has a jury trial and tells us to go away.

Lawyer asks if I can pay anything, she suggests $50/mo. I say I have no ability to pay, as I told Portfolio at least a dozen times. And at $50/mo I'll be dead before it's paid off. I'm 63, semi-retired.

So next trial is set for March 16. I know that if I make a payment, it starts all over again, but unsure what to do, wondering if I go March 26, it'll be a replay of the first court date.

Any comments appreciated

Jim

What you should do may depend on several factors. You say you are semi-retired. So does that mean you are on a pension of some kind and also working some?

You should always prepare for the worst before it happens. If you are on a pension you need to keep the pension money separate from any other money. So if you are on a pension and your pension money is being automatically deposited then don't put any money into that account. Never pay any money into that account unless something like an accidental overdraft occurs. Then you might have to deposit money to cover the overdraft plus maybe $5 or so extra so you have a positive balance. In the event something like that should happen be sure to make the deposit only in cash, never a check that can be traced to some other source of income. The reason for that is that they can't garnish a bank account that only has pension money in it.

If you must have another bank account for other funds then open one somewhere else. If you can cash checks from employers or other sources somewhere besides at your bank then do that instead of having a separate bank account. A grocery store or a check cashing facility would be preferable to a second bank account. >br/>
Did you file a response of some kind with the court or did you just go to court without filing an actual response? If you haven't filed a formal response to the court I think you should do that immediately.

You are getting sued for an amount of money sufficient to be in a district court rather than a small claims court so you can probably use discovery and I think you ought to start using your discovery tools immediately. You might as well make it as painful as possible for them if they are going to make life miserable for you. Might as well return the favor. (LOL)

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