First timer posting here. Need some advice.

Ride it out . . . as you stated, there is no upside to paying this.

 

I agree on riding it out.

 

I never ignore what CAs send. I respond based on what the claims are. A DV is always in order.

Your objective should be to get them gone in such a way that riding them out remains an option.

 

Good advice above . . . don't sit on your rights within the 30 day window.

 

If you'd like to make good on your debt (instead of shafting them), contact the OC and try to get a PFD (paid for deletion) agreeement. You agree to pay the amount due, and they agree to STOP reporting the account in any way, shape, or form (i.e., remove it from your credit histories). Get it IN WRITING before paying one dime.

Remember, they don't HAVE to report anything - they just have to report ACCURATE information, IF they CHOOSE to report it. This is how they can legally remove negative, accurate information.

Call them and trying to negotiate this will NOT cause anything with the nearing SOL if they refuse to any agreement. If that happens, THEN ride it out. At least you TRIED to make good with them.

 

If they have only called, I would wait for their letter to respond. It is useful to know what it is that they are alleging. They are required to mail you details of the claim within 5 days of their call, and that notice must include the Miranda warning stating their obligations if you respond within 30 days of receipt.

There are several ways to write an effective DV, and that is pretty much contingent upon the claim that they present.

Just as Apex recommends, I would just make sure that the DV is posted CMRRR to the CA within 30 days of the date on which you receive their initial correspondence.

Comment for JS: The written demand may or may not actually be correct, or even the OP's. While I concur in settling with the OC when a legitimate claim is made, I generally wait to make sure that the claim is, in fact, legitimate.

This may not even be payable to the OC at this point. Best to know who and what you are dealing with.

I don't like paying either bogus or inflated claims or paying to someone who doesn't have the right to collect. Just me, I guess.

 

One of the reasons the law firm is after you is that your settlements are littering your credit report. That's whay many folks recommend only paying with a PFD. If you allow a collections account to show as paid ... it means to anyone looking that you pay collections accounts.

Nelson is unlikely to let this go past the statute of limitations date since he knows you pay.

Riding it out is unlikely to be an option. Nelson may own it, or Nelson may be working for Pinnacle. Either way, they'll probably file suit if you don't settle with them.

 

This is a point well worth noting.

To attempt collection or not is very much a business decision: Is the cost worth the gain?

This basis of this decision is what shows on the record that can be obtained. If the record shows that it is worth the effort, then the choice is to pursue. If it doesn't, then it's passed on to the next opportunist.

It's all about perception. Nothing personal about this; just an assessment of the economics.

Lesson to be learned: Either clean the TLs off or leave them unpaid.

 

Good points here all. I never really looked at paid collections in this fashion and I've been in this for quite a while. Learn something new everyday.

Again, Flacorps is a good asset to this board and I enjoy reading their posts.

 

Flacorps, You touch upon a subject that opens a dark side to the collection business. There have been cases where CAs will attempt collection for a debt with ALL people who may have that name, or similar SS#. It makes tactical sense, if you lack of ethics to do it.

If you think about it, perhaps there are case where people have intent to default, and slightly change thier name, or SS# on an application. So, the CA hits all the close matches.

Add to that some people just pay a bill/notice without even looking at it, and you have Flacorps' thesis. If you were the CA, who would you go after to get money? (remember, ethics aside).

 

I'm probably not a prophet, it's probably going on already, but it occurs to me that either now or in the future getting the PFD won't mean so much for this purpose, because the larger, more sophisticated JDBs will warehouse their prior CRA pulls with respect to a particular individual, and analyze them versus later pulls for TLs that magically vanish ... then draw their own conclusions about whether payment occurred or the account aged off.

In most cases the only thing they would miss out on would be the notation that would show if the TL remained listed after settlement (meaning they wouldn't be able to tell whether it settled for full value or "less than owed").

The cost of storage memory continues to head into the basement, along with the cost of processing power ... the only thing going up is the capability of the software.

 

Did it make sense for CAMCO? And didn't it get NCO on "double secret probation"?

Short term gain, long term loss in my book...

 

The upside to all this computerization is the development of a list of "debtors who know and aggressively apply the FDCPA." I don't know if they are collectively compiling such a list when it's not really in one CA's interest to tell another about a litigious debtor (because then they couldn't sell the debt) but I'd heard something about debt collection software that would collect the names of plaintiffs who file FDCPA suits and use that list to scrub their database of debts so they don't waste their time (and legal exposure) on those debtors.

 

Can you possibly pin down both the date you went delinquent (well [perhaps 6 months] before the charge-off date) and the SOL date (probably the written contract one, which is probably a year longer than for open accounts) for your state?

Ya gotta know whether Nelson can successfully go to court, or whether they're just bluffing since they know you have an SOL defense if they sue.

Give the dates you're quoting, at 4 years you're probably good, at 5 years you're probably sitting on a ticking time bomb since they need to get it into suit by early next year or it turns into a pumpkin.

 

It would be in their collective interest to avoid having a lot of pro-debtor case law develop and to avoid having a judiciary that sees these sorts of abuses day in and day out. It would also be good to avoid the growth of a cadre of lawyers who make a living on this kind of case, and the growth of legions of consumers who tell their friends, family and workmates how violations were worth $$$ to them.

When congress passes a law and an industry keeps getting found violating it time and time again ... their trials stop being so fair because judges start looking at them sideways in every case...

 

Just to shed a little light on the "computerized" analysis and scrubbing methods above, these guys are generally not too sophisticated. That being said, we've not spoken or dealt with every debt collector in the U.S. I'd say its a fraction at best. But, out of that fraction, there are not too swift.

Through litigation, we've learned that these guys really aren't malicious rather, they're just ignorant. Their mastering of databases is largely a myth. It is more of a shotgun approach to collection and they take their losses as they come through litigation. The aforesaid losses are pittance insofar as far and away, the average citizen still has not even heard of the FDCPA.

You can apply the above to such places as Palisades, Midland, NCO, SMS, AFNI, and even LVNV. They just don't know what they're doing when it comes to reporting and collection. Not justifying that but, it can be expected given the ranks of their employees.

 

I believe you're correct; I can't remember who got nailed for some of these tactics. I believe NCO did take a hit for the "multiple name" shotgun approach, and they had some weak "defense" about not being able to accurately identify the debtor.

But, for them it is about "today's collections"..