Long story short, I've had their card for 13 years, but fell on hard times and couldn't pay the bill for about 60 days. They sent me to a collection agency called GC Services. I had to go get a loan from a bank to pay them 12K immediately, and then I started making 1K monthly payments. I did that for 6 months on time every month, and then GC called and wanted to renegotiate. I told them I couldn't do anything more than I was doing. That I had no more available credit to borrow to pay them off, and that I could only continue to pay 1K per month. They agreed, and said we would renegotiate in May. Well, today I get a call on my cell from a company called NCO Financial. The number was blocked, so I let it go to voicemail. I had no idea who these folks are. I was surprised to get a call from my mother in law 15 minutes later, saying that a company called NCO Financial called her house looking for me regarding "an important personal matter". I then called the number, and found that the AMEX card that had been sold to GC was now with this NCO Financial. They want all sorts of cash up front, higher monthly amounts, etc. I just simply can't do it right now. I've been diligently paying the agreed to amount monthly, but I feel really angry that they would end it several months early through no fault of my own, and start calling my relatives. What do I do? I have no access to additional funds, I can't pay more per month than 1K, and I CANNOT file for bankruptcy. The way my company is structured, I would probably risk losing it... and who would that help if I don't have a job to repay this money? What do I do here? I hesitate to make a deal with NCO, only to have some other bottom feeder credit agency take over a few months later and start calling my relatives. Any ideas?
Amex likely hasn't sold the debt - they usually don't. Its probably on a contingency agreement. That's why GC wanted more. You pay more, they earn more. There are other posts here that clue you in how to make NCO simply go away, but Amex will sue, especially on what seems to be an extremely large amount of money. You might want to work with them. But, at this point, I would suggest you request validation. You want to make sure NCO is collecting the right amount, and that GC Services credited you with all your payments. I would think hard about sending GC any more money - they are likely not on the file anymore. In fact, at this point, you may want to contact Amex directly and find out your balance, etc.
