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The illegal terror tactics employed by debt collectors cause collateral damage too. People with debts don’t fill out USPS address changes when they move, so I receive collections mail for previous residents from years ago. There is no way to stop it because the post office still considers the address valid.
Debt collectors call looking for people I was roommates with decades years ago.
Twice I have incorrectly gotten on cable company collections when they didn’t record my returned modem. They come at me like a freight train even when I show evidence there is literally nothing to collect. They blatantly ignore their legal duties while executing their terroristic campaigns. I have no faith that they would stop collecting when they are legally required to do so. This is a dark realm driven by cynicism.
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The link at the bottom of the article is broken. The one up top works -
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I think it is rather explicitly stating that in the vast majority of cases no individual debit is worth suing over, and the debit collectors don’t actually have the documentation required by law that they need in order to successfully collect from anyone that can write the proper letter and follow the proper procedures.
In particular it asserts that even when the debit is legitimate the collector doesn’t have the right documentation to produce to prove it in court. They have an agreement with whomever they bought it from that they can get it from them, and that is normally via multiple other such hops until you get to the original & at that point the original bank may have a contractual obligation to cough up documentation, but it doesn’t have a process or personal for it, so even if a request gets that far it normally fails.
Oh, and also that the typical debit collector is someone making minimum wage in call center and doesn’t have any real training on how to avoid making statements that land them/the agency into legal hot water, and in fact all the training leads them to statements that are outright illegal. So even if collecting a legit debit and even if against all odds they can get the proper supporting documentation they likely committed three felonies in the first conversation…
…but yeah, sure someone with an unusually large debit esp all owed in one account could actually be held to account for it.
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That’s exactly what I pointe out made your suggestion so dangerous. If you run up $50k in credit card debt, you’re making it worth a collector’s time to pursue.
In some cases the collector won’t have the proper documentation if push comes to shove, but there are plenty of instances where they do, and/or the court simply doesn’t care enough to hold them to their burden if push comes to shove. In my experience, that’s what is so dangerous about the “basically optional” framing without being really clear about what can, and often does, happen.
That’s…not really how it works. First of all, the FDCPA is a civil, not a criminal statute so violations are not “felonies,” the collectors are potentially liable in civil court for $1000 per violation or in a class case up to $500k or 1% of net worth, whichever is less. Unfortunately, the FDCPA has been greatly weakened in most jurisdictions over the last 10-15 years and doesn’t carry nearly the same punch it once did. The result, which is intentional, is that hiring an attorney to take that on and making a financially viable case out of it is not at all easy.
The article is absolutely right that sending the letters and demanding documentation is wise and can sometimes get the collector back off, but it isn’t a magic incantation and most definitely doesn’t guarantee anything. Hence, the danger in your suggestion.
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Ugh, I guess I was unclear, not all on one card. Keep each debit small enough so that it isn’t worth anyone doing anything unusual about.
Ok, in this case I was quoting the article, if you have some first hand knowledge , I’ll trust that.
I’m one of the people who are socially inclined to try to stick to debits I can repay and not walk off just because I think I can.
Except for a morgtage 15 or so years ago where I gave the house back to the bank (short sold it), which to be honest I had every intention of paying when I bought the house. That would be a vastly different situation because houses are large enough values that banks do make an effort to keep the paperwork in order, and I did participate in attempting to find someone who wanted to buy it for a not-insignificant fraction of the value (i.e. I made the house show printable and moved out as opposed to staying in it until forced out, and/or damaging it). I do think actually disclosing the house’s issues pissed off the bank though.
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My dude, let’s say you have ten credit cards, which is a shit load of credit cards, you’re still talking about racking up $5k on each. If you don’t think that’s enough to get sued for, I’d invite you to check out the county courthouse on any of their cattle call trial days and see the kinds of amounts people are routinely sued for by collectors.
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And frequently, when the debt gets sold off to a debt collector? that’s the bank writing it off, especially if it’s old debt.
Had something similar happen to me back in '21 when I had my kidney stone; it took a year and a half to finally settle everything, between the hospital not submitting the claim to my insurance properly (despite me making several calls back and forth, finally having a ‘come to jesus meeting’ with both parties on the phone!), and the doctor on-duty that night not getting around to billing me until a year and 2 months afterwards.
Then there’s the current debacle with the specialist I’ve gone to for sleep apnea waiting 9 months to bill me and socking me for a nearly $400 bill which included all the copays I asked if I should be paying at time of service but was told not to pay by their office. 
On a completely side and semi-related tangent, Just how fucked is someone who declares bankruptcy outside of the black spot on their credit record for 7-10 years? asking for… myself, really. (The nuked response I posted earlier mentioned a $22,000 emergency repair to my house last year, and I have a nasty feeling that a chapter 13 is in my near future if I can’t get some assistance in the next couple months.)
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finally having a ‘come to jesus meeting’ with both parties on the phone
I’m impressed you managed to make that happen. I had a similar issue with a (much smaller, but actually also for sleep-related issues) bill involving a hospital system, my insurance, and an HRA. No two of them would talk to each other in any way whatsoever. Took about 6 months to resolve, and a total of over 20 hrs on the phone with everyone.
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After 68 previous replies (and I didn’t read them, but bear with me), I really wanted to contribute, but there’s very little I can add.
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It’s expensive to be poor.
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We’re all one catastrophe from hitting the skids.
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But more importantly: (it may have been mentioned) - NEVER, EVER give your banking information to these ghouls. Verbal promises to pay; payment plans, etc; all that ends up with them with a (legal) direct way to your finances.
Most collectors will adhere to that payment plan, but there’s nothing saying that they have to.
The best advice is the same as when you’re arrested: Say nothing; seek counsel.
(I know lawyers are expensive. I’ve been trying to find a site I discovered in the early 2000’s about inexpensive ways the layman can push back. I’m still working on trying to remember.)
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IF you are religious bankruptcy is rooted in biblical law - I only brought this up so if you have an objection or worry based on faith - you shouldn’t. Deuteronomy 15:1-11
Outside of that - if you are spending on credit stop - look up bankruptcy lawyers - I’d expect the fee to be in the 700-1500 range but that’s pretty old data. If you are really put out ask your lawyer they can include the fee in the bankruptcy so you still have options even if you are totally broke. You will need a list of everyone that you owe money to - if you are being sued - you need to make sure that’s on the list - if you are trying to ignore the debt - include it on the list. I’d go so far as to pull your credit report and if something is on there you forgot or question or even think is paid off - include it on the list. You can amend this while you are filing - but it’s much more of a PITA to add something after the court rules the plan is ok.
After this expect to go through mandatory classes that tell you how buying clothes is why you are broke and you are bad for being so. Also expect to be sold a ‘debt consolidation’ plan that is IIRC now mandatory also until it doesn’t work. I recall this being an option only if your leftover income would be ok after whatever the payment would be - if not you skip straight to the court.
The law is different in every state and even every local court - this is filed in federal court but the local trustee and judges will have … quirks that will be specific to your area - your lawyer can advise you if this will be an issue. The state/federal laws will lay out what you can keep - but I believe if you chapter 13 there is no limit to what you can keep as long as you pay - your lawyer will advise you better on the fine details. If your house has a mortgage expect the bank to possibly be a dick unless you are 100% on time and keep them out of the plan.
After all that if you go chap 13 you get a payment plan based on your income that lasts 3-5 years - it’s going to be based on the maximum percentage of your income allowed - and once the plan is done your debts are wiped out. Chapter 7 can sell assets I think if you have them that are outside of what you are allowed to keep - that goes into talk to your lawyer territory. Anyway - your credit is going to suck from the second you file until your plan is over - and be pretty crappy after that until 7-10 years go by. Crappy doesn’t mean gone - just expect rates to be double to triple what you would expect if you MUST get a loan - if you have a life changing emergency while in a plan you’d need to go to the court for permission to change things.
Hope that helps.
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This is exceptionally common - the misbilling and miscoding part. I’ve had it happen to me or my family at least half a dozen times. From the other side of the hospital/clinic, on the supplier side, we see it, too. Hospitals are reimbursed by insurers and Medicare/Medicaid with expenses for billing and coding factored in - but of course that’s seen as a “cost center” by the bean counters. So they understaff billing and coding. Then they ask their suppliers - “hey, how do we code for your products?” Some suppliers explain that 1. We aren’t supposed to do that; and 2. We don’t have a billing and coding department, you do. Others just go with it and publish coding guides that are obsolete before the ink dries, because billing and coding are hard and there are different codes and guidelines for just about every region of every payer.
Here’s an example of a coding guide document from a medical device company. Some hospitals are reluctant to do business with suppliers who don’t provide this information, even though we legally aren’t supposed to.
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Yes, if you provide your passport. And depending on the circumstance you don’t even have to do that.
But back to the bigger point: even if you provide your passport number, I’m pretty sure the credit reporting agencies and debt collectors will have no way of using that to track you, let alone connect you with an individual file obtained from a credit reporting agency. So at the end of the day, having your passport number is all but useless to them, unlike an SSN.
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This is so fucking true.
When I first moved out of the family home, I was paying about a third of my income on rent (actually good compared to today’s renters!), and then on top of that, the shitty little flat I was renting had no insulation, no double-glazing, electric heaters and a coin meter for the electricity that the landlord controlled. That meant, if I wanted to stay warm in the winter, I’d be spending upwards of an extra £10 per day into the meter (this was the mid Nineties until 2007).
By the time I got out of that place and moved to London to start working, I had been living out of my overdraft for over ten years. For all that time, my balance would creep over £0, only to plunge back under.
I was driving shitty cars that were the only ones I could afford, that cost me more in maintenance than a newer car would have. I could only buy cheap clothes, that would tear easier than more expensive clothes, meaning I had to buy them more often.
I was buying shit, cheap, fast food, because I couldn’t afford to cook.
It also didn’t help that as I was trying to get a career in media off the ground, I had taken out a loan with my bank to buy a new Mac, because there was no way I could afford it otherwise.
By 2006, I’d also slipped into depression, and was not taking care of my personal appearance, which lead to me being teased and bullied by local youths, the end result of which was getting attacked and permanently losing most of the vision in my right eye. I got no compensation for this.
After getting out of hospital, I wrote my car off on the way to work one morning, because I didn’t see a car coming from the right.
Ironically, my insurance payout was more than twice what I’d paid for the car, and enabled me to take a chance on a job in London that paid twice as much, after which I was quickly able to clear my overdraft, and with a little extra luck, life has progressively gotten better.
But until I actually had money, I couldn’t afford to buy the things that would help me save it.
That’s what makes me so angry about solar panels in the UK at the mo. Only those with a good income can afford them, and the end result is they end up paying less for energy (especially if they can also afford an electric car).
All of this is completely out of reach of those who would most benefit from the technology.
My mortgage gets lower every year, allowing me to save more money to put back in to the mortgage making it lower even quicker, so year on year my “rent” goes down, and I reckon I’ll have it paid off in two years, at which point my disposable income will see another massive hike.
All the while, junior engineers where I work are having to bid on single rooms in shared accommodation that cost twice as much as my monthly mortgage payments, keeping them poorer for longer while the landlords use that money to buy more properties that these engineers can’t even afford the deposit of.
Fuck capitalism.
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Yep, been there, too. And even if you have the means to cook, fresh produce and lean meats cost more money than packaged, processed foods and high fat meats, so it costs more to eat healthy even if you can afford to cook and have the means to do so. Years ago, I went to nursing school for while (big mistake…nurses are awesome, but I couldn’t do it) and several of us got into a big argument with our anatomy instructor, who was a chiropractor, one day about this. He kept saying that, in the long run, eating healthier was cheaper. And we kept telling him that while that was true, if you were poor, it just wasn’t an option, and he just refused to believe it. Most of us were living that experience at that moment, and he was just dismissive of the idea, like we were all just idiots.
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Yeah, I tried explaining that to a friend I used to work with who was married with two kids and had a mortgage (which at the time I didn’t have), and her reaction was the same.
And this is the key problem:
Those with means can’t comprehend the challenges of those without.
Oh, and while money is less of an issue for me now, one of the side effects of eating so poorly for so long is type 2 diabetes.
And there’s lots of people like me out there, which in turn puts more strain on the NHS.
If government was serious about reducing the pressure on the service, they’d make sure that minimum wage really was enough to support a healthy diet. There’s so much science supporting the idea that a better diet allows for better concentration at school, leading to better grades and better prospects. But nope, these fuckers can’t think that many steps ahead.
Better regulation of the food industry and quality controls would help, but better food education and availability is the best solution.
It’s easy to see why many people brand the tories a death cult.
It’s tempting to put it down to malice, but I believe it’s nothing more than the ignorance of privilege.
If you’ve never had to worry about where your next meal is coming from, why would you waste energy thinking about it?
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Admittedly, they are the ones that are driving me to this choice with the harassing phone calls and demands that I produce blood from a stone. I’ve been tempted to ask them point blank “which bank would you like me to rob in order to pay you” except that the calls are recorded.
It does, thank you.
All of this could likely have been prevented over a year ago if one of the companies gave me something like three months forbearance to re-arrange my payment setup and get some breathing room, but here we are.
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It feels like a lot of comments are missing an important nuance of this statement. There’s the don’t worry it’s not that bad comments, and the only do this if you can take the credit hit impact comments. But, they’re both missing an important part. The statement about not paying isn’t about not paying any debts. It is specifically about not paying debts that have already been sent to collections. That is a very important distinction.
All those bad things that can happen when you don’t pay a debt have already happened. That ship sailed and is long gone by this point. The article points out that paying the debt now, to a collections company, is not going to undo any of those bad things. That it’s not even going to stop additional collections companies from trying to collect the same debt over and over again.
The optional statement in the article doesn’t mean the article is suggesting you go run up a fun weekend on credit cards and then don’t bother paying it back. It’s only saying, if you’ve already not paid back that credit card and the credit card company stopped trying to collect and instead sold your debt to a collections agency, then you shouldn’t bother paying it back. No matter what you pay the collections agency at that point, it isn’t going to fix your problems and impacts with the original credit card company. It’s not likely going to stop the collections agency or additional collections agencies from trying to collect on that same debt multiple times either.
The takeaway I got from the article was that once a debt has been sent to a collections agency, all the bad stuff it is going to cause has already happened to you. That paying any of, or even acknowledging that it is yours at this point can only cause additional bad stuff and expense. Just like the original company gave up on collecting the debt, you should give up on paying it or even acknowledging anything about it.
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A complementary read to the article is this answer to a question about getting out of co-signed debt after a breakup. I’d read this one a few years ago, and it dovetails nicely with the article.
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