Thanks for responding Bill. Her standing up in court and doing this might be a problem as she just does not have that type personality. She is also somewhat hearing impaired so it is possible that I "might" be allowed to stand with her at least, but probably not speak on her part. The appearance date is this Thursday so my goal for that is just to appear and not have a judgment issued against her then. Perhaps, if given enough time and with a little bit of help from here perhaps I can nit pick the case a bit and maybe find an advantage or two. Any suggestions or recommendations for the first appearance?
I haven't read through all the posts, but read the first few.... Anyway, a similar situation occured for me a few years back, got an $8000 bill, long story short: Contact the HOSPITAL, sometimes it's a matter of the codes that were entered on their end that kicks it back from the insurance company. They may not be as willing to work with you now that it is in collections, but it's worth a shot. In my situation they wiped away the entire bill, even though I realistically did owe at least the deductible! I worked for an insurance company for many years and they could care less about what is going on, they don't have to care....so sad.
First and highly important is be sure to get a court reporter there for the hearing. You must contact the clerk of the court before the trial and say that you want a court reporter present at the hearing. That will cost you $20 or so. Tell her to watch out for the judge asking leading questions. If the judge asks any leading questions she should object. I wish we had more time for her to study. I have a program that is actually a game that she could play that would teach her what to watch out for and how to respond to statements by counsel and judges. It is a really tough program to beat. Like most other games it has several scenaios and each is different. As the player successfully completes on phase it takes them to a higher level. I wish I could email it to you but I can't because it is far too big for email. If you want it I'll gladly let you have it for free but it will have to be sent via File Transfer Protocol (FTP) using a program called filezilla which is also free for the downloading. You can find it easily by google search. I have an FTP server up and running at all times and all you have to do is log on to it and download it. Only takes a few minutes via FTP. The program is a real brain twister because you only have a few seconds to answer each question the program asks you. You have to play the program for days and days before you get really proficient at it so you really have to think on your feet so to speak. I'll let anyone have it for free with no obligations whatever. I'm not worried about anyone getting it and also passing it around because first of all it is too big to email and so they too would need a file server and setting one of those up is a real bear to say the least. You really have to know how to do it or you will never get it to work. One of the problems is that you can't get it to work through a windows firewall so you have to turn your firewall off. In order to do that and still be safe is to use a special type of anti-virus software that has it's own firewall and setting that up isn't easy either. Took retnec (another sometimes poster on this forum) and I working together over the phone about 5 days to get it set up and working. He is in Florida and I'm in Oklahoma City. He is a whole lot smarter on some of this stuff than I am. For instance, I do quite a few seminars, about 3 a month and I usually like to show and educational video at each seminar. They deal with constitutional law and all that sort of thing. I have a Western Digital video player that runs off of a pair of 2 terrabyte hard drives so I can store more movies than you can imagine. It plays videos to a big screen TV so all I need to replace a projector and screen is a big screen TV which is easy enough to carry around. Tuck it under one arm and slip the player into a pocket and you are ready to go to the movies. Most movies have to be converted so they will play on a TV or off of a CD or a hard drive. Retnec converts those videos for me and helps me with lots of programs. It took us about 4 to 5 hours every night for almost a week to set up that server and make it work right so not many would be willing to go to all that trouble just to pass free programs around. (LOL). Of course I have lots of reasons to want to do that other than just passing free programs around. Passing those videos back and forth is also just another side benefit. So if you or anybody else wants a copy of that mock trial program to sharpen up on their courtroom skills all they have to do is download filezilla, install it and let me know they have it so I can teach them how to log into my server and download it for free. You will have to give me a user name and a password in order to get in. Even if you don't want the free mock trial program I do wish you good luck in court. As a side note, I'm willing to bet that even Apex can't get through all the screens and he is a practicing lawyer. That's how tough it is to beat the game and get all the way through it. Apex is more than welcome to get the program and let us know how far he can get as well. Let's see if he will take the challenge. (LOL)
Bill, I'd love a copy of it. I'm familiar with FTP so that won't be a problem. She should have some time to study since Thursday, as I understand, is just to set a trial date. Trail will be set 6-8 weeks later according to some information I have found.
OK. I'm having trouble with the computer today. I just installed Windows 7 ultimate and we can't get it to connect to the internet. We even tried to connect through a cell phone and while the cellphone connects just fine the computer itself still won't surf. We upgraded from a beta version to a full version.
illinimike> Bill, I'd love a copy of it. I'm familiar with FTP so that won't be a problem. She should have some time to study since Thursday, as I understand, is just to set a trial date. Trail will be set 6-8 weeks later according to some information I have found. billbauer> OK. I'm having trouble with the computer today. I just installed Windows 7 ultimate and we can't get it to connect to the internet. We even tried to connect through a cell phone and while the cellphone connects just fine the computer itself still won't surf. We upgraded from a beta version to a full version. ----- Dumb Bob has very little to say here other than his head is ready to explode.
Help! Emergency! Call out the bomb squad! Call Homeland Security! This has to be some kind of terrorist threat!
Thanks to everyone who responded. Her first appearance is tomorrow. I hope that between now and the trial date I can help her to get the insurance to cover some of the bills they did not pay anything on. Has anyone had much luck getting creditors to settle for less? What they are asking for now is well past her means to pay off in any reasonable time and I would be strapped to help. Any suggestions? Thanks again.
I really wouldn't get all that bothered by a judgment. After all a judgment does not say you have to pay anything to anybody. A judgment is nothing more than a court order saying that you owe the money. I does not say you must pay anything to anybody. A court order saying you have to pay up is called a garnishment and in most jurisdictions it takes at least 30 days after the judgment becomes final before any garnishment can take place. It will probably take at least another 30 days before they can get a motion for garnishment order before the court. Even then they have to know what they are going to garnish so it may take a garnishment hearing to determine what assets she has that can be garnished. You can do an awful lot of things in 30 to 60 days to make sure they can't get anything.
Thanks Bill. We head up there soon. I'm still not happy about this "appearance fee" but seems like little I can do about that. I am going to recommend to her that she ask for a bench trial as I understand that in Illinois you have a choice of bench or jury. There are some added expenses for a jury trial. Any last minute advice?
