Paid a company in full then they sent me to collections almost a year later. WHAT to do???

Question

I am at my wits end. My car was towed a few years ago. It stayed in storage for a while. I negotiated with the tow company owner for payment. He would accept CASH ONLY $300. I paid the negotiated amount. About 11 months later he sent me to collections saying I paid NOTHING. I contacted the collection & tow company of the error. Neither would listen to me, only telling me to provide the receipt. I could not locate the receipt. I didn't know what to do. I wanted to buy a house and this was affecting my credit. I took both companies to small claims court and WON! I won on the grounds that the tow company by law was to accept bank card payment, the collection company refused to validate their claim, and I was unfairly sent toThey appealed. The second judge would hardly let me speak, wouldn't take my witness statement because it was in writing and she could not appear for a 2nd time. He turned around the decision. THEY WON. This is STILL on my credit. INJUSTICE TO SAY THE LEAST

Answer 1

I see this very often. Unfortunetly for you without valid documentation (copy of a recipt, official letter from the tow company, etc) the collection will not come off of your credit. This certainly has and will continue to hurt your credit. You are going to have to make the decision to keep fighting or pay the amount they "claim" is due.

If you pay them again, document EVERYTHING. Pay with a cashier's check or personal check that way you can get a copy of it when it clears and KEEP a copy of it. Additionally, once you submit the check to the collection agency stay on top of the to have them write a letter on their letterhead stating the account is paid-in-full. Tell them to reference the date it was paid, the account number and that it is paid-in-full, zero balance. From there, do not put trust in them to correctly report it as paid to the credit reporting agencies (Equifax, Experian and TransUnion). YOU do it yourself. Get all of your documentation together (cancelled check and letter) and submit the information to all 3 credit reporting companies, thus, it will start to report as paid on your credit.

It certainly isn't a fair situation, but is your time, effort and stress really worth the fight? If it's something you possibly can afford, bite the bullet and pay the amount correctly this time. Good luck.

Answer 2

Let me start with this....

KELSEY, that answer pisses me off something awful!

Hey, wait....you owe me $300 for the internet connection co-charge you are using. I do expect your payment within 30 days and...huh? You don't owe me anything? Well, wouldn't you rather just pay me this piddly 300 and avoid all of the stress and aggravation? It's not worth your time to try suing me or demanding validation. Just send me your money.

See how stupid that sounds?

To answer this question...please tell me you didn't go into an appeal without having an attorney! They walked all over you with court rules, and without a good knowledge of how the system works you will never get anywhere.

You can do this in small claims court, where the judges are supposed to grant you a wide variance because you are not expect to understand the law, but if you walk into a higher court and defend yourself they will eat you up! I'm very sorry to hear this.

By chance did anyone even answer the question of how you got your car out of impound without paying anything? You obviously got yourself a very anti-consumer judge.

Answer 3

Not going into the court cases as there is not enough information to help you with that. Let's just take one statement you said. "the collection company refused to validate their claim"..

How do you have them validate the claim? Was it in writting by a certified letter? When they refused did they actually validate it or just never responded. Per the FDCPA if you send a validation request they must validate it or can no longer persue collection activites. If they do then they can be sued for $1000 per violation. However, in order to claim this you must do specific things.

The link below talks about debt validation and what you need to do.

Answer 4

You really need that receipt. It is the resolution to the whole mess. It sounds like you put a lot of time and money into this already and I'm sure it's really more the principle now than the money.

You can attach an explanation to your credit report. This may not hurt you credit as much.

Answer 5

There's a business rule: "IF IT'S NOT IN WRITING IT DID NOT HAPPEN"!

Only thing you can do now is offer a settlement, and get it in writing from the creditor not the collection agency.

If you want to buy a house you are going to have to resolve this.

The thing with the court is over. Witness statement needed to be notarized.