Class-action lawsuit against Dect Collectors

[BigCountry00]

What is the name of your state? VA
Not sure how long this post will be, but please bare with me. To give you a short-version, I received a letter from a debot collector concerning a long-distance phone company that I had 6 years ago. I sent a certified letter, with a return receipt asking them to tell me more info. 6 months pass and I hear nothing. I then get another letter from a different decbt collector, but dealing with the same issue. I contact a lawyer and they tell me that I should fight it. The debt collector already had reported my info to the credit bureaus before I even received the first letter. I went and paid the money owed, to try to get it off my credit report. Is there something else I should do to a)try to get my credit score fixed correctly since this happened 6 years ago and I never knew about it until it was too late or b)any type of monetary reimbursement? Thanks to anyone who can help. To be honest, i am not sure if I should get an attorney up front and eat the cost or not.

 

[ecmst12]

Monetary reimbursement for what? You asked for validation and rather then comply, they sold the debt to another collector. That's legal. You paid the second collector. Great! The debt should now be reported as paid off on your credit report. If it's not, you can dispute it with the credit bureaus. It will drop off your reports after 7.5 years so you're almost there anyway.

 

[BigCountry00]

It was not reported until this year though, before I received the first letter. Is it 7.5 years from when it was reported, or 7.5 years from when the "debt" was incurred?

 

[ecmst12]

7.5 years from the date of first delinquency; usually 30 days after your first missed payment.

 

[TigerD]

It was not reported until this year though, before I received the first letter. Is it 7.5 years from when it was reported, or 7.5 years from when the "debt" was incurred?

It is sevens years plus 180 days from when it went late.

Also, now that it is paid, wait about 4-6 months then dispute the entry with the credit bureaus. The CA will not respond 70 - 80 percent of the time and the entry will be deleted.

DC

 

[BigCountry00]

So I will wait until after January-February to take care of. Do I have a legitimate complaint if I take it to court since I sent a certified-return receipt the first time?

 

[Ladynred]

I went and paid the money owed, to try to get it off my credit report.

Paying an old debt, or any debt, does NOT remove it from your credit reports. It WILL lower your score though, because you just update the date of last activity !! Now you're stuck with a paid collection, which is still a negative, but it must still drop off because the reporting period runs, as noted, from the date of the first deliquency with the original creditor.

Do I have a legitimate complaint if I take it to court since I sent a certified-return receipt the first time?

Complaint for what ?? The first collection agency did nothing wrong in selling the debt. They didin't want to bother fighting you over validation, they want an EASY mark, so they just washed their hands of it. This is not a violation of the FDCPA.

 

[BigCountry00]

Thanks to everyone who replied. I guess I cannot figure out why a long-distance phone company would not try to contact me to settle an old bill until 6 years after the fact. I paid the debt collector the money and I contacted them and they said they would send me a "paid in full" letter. Will this do anything for me, concerning my credit report or just "suck it up" and wait 7 years for it to drop off?

 

[moburkes]

Thanks to everyone who replied. I guess I cannot figure out why a long-distance phone company would not try to contact me to settle an old bill until 6 years after the fact. I paid the debt collector the money and I contacted them and they said they would send me a "paid in full" letter. Will this do anything for me, concerning my credit report or just "suck it up" and wait 7 years for it to drop off?

Debtcollector answered your question already.

 

[BigCountry00]

Thank you.