I was served papers this morning. They were served at my house, and my girlfriend called to tell me about it, so I haven't actually seen them yet. But it's in regard to an old Citibank debt from a couple years ago. (Not nearly past SOL, so that defense is out). The court date is only a week and a half away, and I can't afford an attorney. I also can't take off work to go to court. What do I do? I'm completely freaking out right now. Dan
if no one shows up on your behalf they will get a default judgment, and the next step will be to garnish your salary. You say you cannot afford to take off from work, well can you afford 10% of your take home pay being seized each paycheck until the debt is paid? You had better show up and ask for a continuance until you can figure it all out
Call the court and request a continuation notifying them that you were just served with the papers and you need more notice to request the time off work. They're usually pretty good about that kind of stuff.
I'll have to check my records when I get home to see if I sent any validation requests to them. But even if I did, does Citibank have to abide by the rules of the FDCPA and/or recognize validation requests? I was under the impression that those rules only applied to Collection Agencies, NOT original creditors. Was I misinformed about that?
I checked my records. Yes, I requested validation from this particular CA. In fact, this is the THIRD CA involved with citibank. the first two apparently gave up after recieving a Validation Requests, and sent the file to the next CA. This one got a Validation Request from me about 6 months ago, and then did nothing until now. On another note, how do I go about finding a lawyer? I have no clue, with thousands of them in the city. (I'm in chicago). And the papers served say I have to "File an appearance" and "Pay the appropriate fees". How exactly do I file an appearance, and why would I have to PAY to respond to a complaint?
You say that this CA got a validation request from you 6 months ago...hopefully you have the letter and certified mail receipts to prove that? As far as court...you need to file an "answer" to the summons....the court clerk should have a "pro-se" office to help individuals file - basically you want to deny everything except your true name, address, ssn# etc. There are fees for filing with the court...if you win your case they can most likely be recovered from the plaintiffs If you really can't find a lawyer, go to the court and you will see many lawyers in the lobby, it can't hurt to ask a few of them what it would cost to represent you
