How to Check Out if I Owe Money to a Company

[Andre_Ch]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? State of a case is California. Current state is New Mexico.

Firstly, sorry for any mistakes I'll make writing this letter. English is my second language.

My situation. I cancelled my Comcast account in California at the end of September 2015 at the Comcast office. After that I relocated to Albuquerque, NM and opened the other Comcast account here in October 10th, 2015. I pay all my bills at a proper time. In California I set up automatic charging from my credit card. So, Comcast just took money monthly.

A week ago I found on the Credit Carma website that my credit score was significantly reduced due an opened collection account. I've learned that Comcast on November 30, 2015 transferred $57 to a collecting agency. What alerted me that I have not received bills online (I do not know if they've sent mail to my previous Californian address) and that they were able to charge money automatically. The last Californian bill I have from October was $0.

I've called today to the Comcast Security and Collecting Departments. They refused to give me any information about money I owed them. They said that they can do something to find if that was their mistake only after I pay to the collecting agency. Also a guy from the Collecting Department somewhat to threatened me saying that collecting agencies become angry if they learn that their "clients" have conflict with such a company like Comcast. Because the Comcast Financial Department was closed when I called them today's evening I'll be able to speak with them tomorrow only. But after I've spent 3 hours trying to find some information chatting and calling Comcast services I'm not sure that tomorrow's call will help.

I called to the collecting agency today as well. They demanded me to pay that money and sent email with information. It seems like they are not a fake agency.

Also I've made a dispute request through Credit Carma.

I'm ready to pay money in a case I indeed owe them. What I'm not ready to do is to pay for someone's mistake. Could you, please, answer what is the best action for me in this situation? Is that correct that Comcast refused to provide information regarding that bill to me?

Thank you,
Andrei

 

[OHRoadwarrior]

You need to legally dispute the debt with the collection company usually within 30 days, to seek validation.

 

[Andre_Ch]

You need to legally dispute the debt with the collection company usually within 30 days, to seek validation.

Will do. Thank you.

 

[single317dad]

I would begin by contacting Comcast. If they still hold the bill (e.g. they haven't sold it outright, just contracted a collection agency), then they are the party that can fix it. Be prepared to waste several hours trying to get Comcast to resolve any billing issue. The stories I've heard about Comcast are... well,I'll let you research it because I'd rather not be sued by them.

If your time is worth money to you, it might be best to just pay the bill. If not, demand that whoever actually holds the debt right now prove to you that you owe it.

 

[Andre_Ch]

Thank you for the answers. Today I called the Comcast billing department. That problem was solved surprisingly quickly - withing 15 minutes. They agreed that that was their mistake, promised to take that debt out and apologized for damaging my credit score.

I've requested dispute via Credit Karma and sent a dispute email to the collecting agency.

Thanks again.