One of my credit card accounts went into collections. I received a summons/complaint in January 2012. I called the debt collector and arranged a mutually agreed-upon payment plan. Thus far, the payments have been made on time (I have copies of the cancelled checks to prove it). Today, I received a notice of judgment lien. How is this possible when I have made all of my required payments? I have looked through my records and I found a bit of a discrepancy. When I contacted the debt collector, I was told to make the payment out to the collector. However, I found a letter that was sent to me and it stated that I should make the check/money order out to the creditor. I have made the checks out to the debt collector and was never informed thereafter that I was incorrect in doing so. It seems that while the collector is cashing the checks, my account has not been updated to reflect the payments. When I contact the collector, would they be able to rescind the judgment lien?
Re: Set Up Payment Plan with Debt Collector. Received notice of Judgment Lien! HELP Sounds like there's some miscommunication going on here. If the CA has been collecting payments on behalf of the OC, then they need to be updating your account with that information. Do you have a signed agreement with the CA?
Re: Set Up Payment Plan with Debt Collector. Received notice of Judgment Lien! HELP I don't have a signed agreement, per se, however I do have a letter that indicates the agreed-upon payment plan. What puzzles me even more about this is: (1) I have included the file/reference number in the memo field of each check and (2) how the debt collector has simply cashed the checks and has never once attempted to contact me about the discrepancy.
Re: Set Up Payment Plan with Debt Collector. Received notice of Judgment Lien! HELP I have since contacted the debt collector and was informed that the original creditor asked that a judgment lien be filed even though my payments have been made on time. It was filed as a "safety net" for the creditor in the event that my debt will not be paid in full. Is this legal?
Re: Set Up Payment Plan with Debt Collector. Received notice of Judgment Lien! HELP Question, did you deal exclusively with the CA, and not through the court? If you didn't go through the court process, while going through the negotiations with the CA; the court issues what is referred to as a default judgement. Yes, the CA should notify the court that "hey, bagladie, entered into an agreement to repay." and that should suspend the court process. Frankly, if the OC told the CA to have the judgement entered anyway, that sets up a really bad faith. Whether or not it's legal would depend on your state. I personally would try to write to the highest person at the OC's company and try to negotiate a goodwill deletion of the judgement lien, as being an act of bad faith.
