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summons for debt collection WA state

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agkemph

Junior Member
STATE: Washington
I received a court summons in person today with a 20 day limit to respond before default judgement is entered and the collection agency gets whatever it wants, including lien, public sale of property and/or wage garnishment.
Summons is dated June 4 2010 filed in court june 18th, and served to me on July 20th 2010.
First question, when does the 20 days start? 2nd question. How do I respond. 3rd question: can attorneys start the filing process to stop the process and the garnishment of my wages before I pay them their total fee? because that is my problem, I don't have 1500.00, I can make a down payment of about 300.00
I have not filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy yet but plant to, but am trying to find an affordable lawyer that will accept down payment to start filing.

Thanks for any info/advice
Gina
 
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Proserpina

Senior Member
STATE: Washington
I received a court summons in person today with a 20 day limit to respond before default judgement is entered and the collection agency gets whatever it wants, including lien, public sale of property and/or wage garnishment.
Summons is dated June 4 2010 filed in court june 18th, and served to me on July 20th 2010.
First question, when does the 20 days start? 2nd question. How do I respond. 3rd question: can attorneys start the filing process to stop the process and the garnishment of my wages before I pay them their total fee? because that is my problem, I don't have 1500.00, I can make a down payment of about 300.00
I have not filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy yet but plant to, but am trying to find an affordable lawyer that will accept down payment to start filing.

Thanks for any info/advice
Gina


First, a bankruptcy attorney will need to be paid in full, up front, before filing - otherwise his/her fees will simply be included in the filing and that's not in their best interests at all. I know of not one single bk attorney who will file a darned thing until everything is paid in full.

Second, if you're a fairly simple no-asset Ch 7 you may want to consider filing an emergency petition pro se (without an attorney); upon receipt of notification all collection efforts by your creditors will cease (including wage garnishments etc). Your $300 would be enough to cover the entire thing (less mailing fees), more or less, if you went pro se. However this is not usually advised, and is really only appropriate if you're - as I mentioned - a simple no-asset case AND if you're willing to do the groundwork.

I'm not sure which district you're in but I can say that the Western Washington BK Court is extremely helpful to pro se bk litigants.

(Which is saying something because the trustees in many jurisdictions really don't like us pro se folk!)
 
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