Can I negotiate with Dell?

Question

Ok, so about a year ago, my brother opened up an account with Dell Financial under my name. He never made any payments and I started getting calls around Christmas time last year regarding late payments and what not. I payed them what they had asked, and then it happened again after about 3 months when my brother said he would make payments. long story short, my brother has not made payments, I know it's something I need to work out with him in terms of payment, and I already have, however, the Dell account is at $1900 when the original purchase was about $1500, and i've already paid about $650. I told them the story about my brother opening it under my name without me knowing and offered to settle for $1200, which would still be $1850 total, so they'd still be getting a profit, but they wont accept it and continue harrassing me and calling 8 times a day. Is there anything else I can do or am I basically screwed?

Answer 1

The "do not call list" DOES NOT APPLY to companies with which you have legal business. That would be just dumb if your own accounts couldn't call you. So that's not going to heelp you. Its only for cold calling.

That said, you should not have agreed to pay a dime, nor should you have started. At first it would have screwed up your credit, yes, but Dell did not do their job with verifying your identity, and thus your ID was compromised or stolen. They would then sue your brother and he would get criminal charges of identity theft, and you wouldnt owe a dime.


At this point, if you're not willing to "turn in" your brother, you're screwed, yep. If you're overlimit, atleast bargain with them about reducing fees or APR. Aside from that, you need to continue making payments...making a 'settlement" can be damaging to your credit-- its shown as a settlement or Charge off and can really deduct points from your score....so you dont neccessarily want to do it in the first place.

Answer 2

You need to sue your brother. If you are not willing to do so, you have assumed responsibility for the debt. As far as Dell is concerned, you did that when you made the first payment. Failing to close the account after the first purchase is interpreted as authorizing your brother to use your account. For whoever mentioned the 'do not call list': it does not apply to companies with which you have an account. If they are calling 8 times a day (which I doubt), that is harassment. You can tell them in writing not to contact you again. If you do, they will have little choice other than suing you.

Answer 3

1. You are in fact screwed -- both by Dell and your brother.
2. If they are indeed calling you 8 times a day, that is harrassment and you can tell them to stop calling you and they must;
3. Document all calls (names, times, substance of the calls);
4. Put a public notice in the newspaper stating that you are not responsible for any debts incurred by your brother -- unless you are indeed paying for his debts.
5. Tell your brother (and mean it) that you will have him arrested and jailed if he uses your credit again unless you have knowingly let him use your credit before;
6. Send them a certified letter explaining the entire situation and how you plan to repay the debt with specific dates and amounts;
7. Pay them the full amount as quickly as possible and according to the terms you laid out in your letter;
8. Close the account so your brother cannot use it again;
9. Find out what other accounts he has access to and close them or have them put on "fraud alert".

Answer 4

account is in your name. You owe them the money plus late fees. Your credit score and rating is going to be pretty bad unless you get this taken care of. You are risking losing credit cards, other financing for houses, this will show up if you go to rent an apartment, etc.

Your brother screwed you, and dell is just trying to get paid for equipment. Close the account immediately so he can't buy anything else on the account, and call them to see if you can set up a payment plan and don't default on it.

Answer 5

Basically Yeah, Unless if Dell send your account to a collection agency who buys off from Dell then you will start dealing with the Agency and not with Dell since they will no longer have anything to do with you. You can try to talk to the manager and let him/her know what they can do or set up payments. This happens to me and eventually it went to collection but the collection agency got tired of me so they decided to drop charges from 1,000 to 560.00 and of course I finally payed if off after 5 years and not paying it to begin with. My sister still never payed me back since then. Good luck! I hope it will go well for you! But remember! You don't let anyone use your credit for whatever reasons! Ever heard that sometimes blood is thicker than water? Its not necessarily true because it not always like that and you know that saying goes that people will ****** you up.....well in this case sometimes your own family will ****** you up worse. I'm sorry to hear that happen to you!
I hope everything will go ok!

Answer 6

If he opened it with out you knowing, unfortunately the problem there is with your brother, and it will depend how far you want to go with that. Technically you could report it as fraud, file a police report, get it wiped out in court, etc. Since you probably don't want to do that, though. . .you'd just have to go to him directly. If you agreed to let him use your name, and hence, your credit, then you are 100% responsible and Dell won't care who got the computer, or the amount, they are going to want what was signed and agreed on in their inital documents.

Answer 7

close the account open a new one and don't tell your brother about it.

Then tell dell you will pay them 50 dollars a month and then send it if they refuse then you can consioder the bill paid because they refused payment

Answer 8

well what you can do is tell them that you want them to verify the debt and that you are contesting it under the FDCPA (fair debt collections practicing act)..basically it states that if you contest a debt the company has 30 days to verify the debt if not then it must be forgiven. You can write them a letter I suggest sending it by certified mail and let them know that you wish to not receive anymore mail or phone calls and they have to stop calling you because it is harassment, if they can continue to call you then you can report them and they will get fined....I would suggest taking those steps first and see what becomes of it. I would also tell them that you are fully aware of the FDCPA and you know your rights and have reported them already.

Answer 9

In my adventure credit facilities have a tendency to apply stress like this to get the funds. in all danger, it ought to cost them more beneficial to repossess the computing device than that's worth. that's except your mom bought some servers. She ought to proceed to make the funds as ideal she will have the capacity to and skim the credit settlement she signed. She ought to have agreed that if she will have the capacity to't make the funds she ought to provide it lower back (probably in the important points). Kill them with kindness no be counted how impolite they get. keep negotiating with them. Ask to talk to a manager each and anytime you confer with them. Write down names, worker numbers, and so on. Arm your self with thoughts. If she is making each attempt to pay them, they'll unlikely attempt to take it. good success with this ordeal. desire it extremely works out on your mom.

Answer 10

yes you are screwed. However if you tell dell to put you on the "do not call " list they legally can not call you. Or get caller ID