Posts: 5,938
Name: Adam for web page design, not program
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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As stupid as this sounds on the surface, the agency. What most people don't know is that the creditor usually sells the debt to the agency for pennies on the dollar just to try and get something back and a lot of settlements can be legitimately negotiated at a much lower rate. It doesn't do any damage to your credit rating at this point, because the black mark is already there anyway.
That, and credit agencies don't have any real authority. They just bluff, and a lot of people fall for it. My favorites are the ones that call cell phone numbers that were reassigned and end up threatening the new person without realizing it. It's happened to both myself and my girlfriend, so I studied up on collection agency law to figure out if there were a way that I could immediately sue them for harassment (because in the case of my GF, they just kept calling after she told them she didn't know the old person, and neither did I.)
Finally, they interrupted our dinner one night so I answered the phone.
"HEWWO!"
"Yes, is Tomas (can't remember the last name) there?"
"Look, my girlfriend already told you that she didn't know Tomas. I don't know who the person is either. This is a cell phone number, as is indicated by the area code (Toronto phone companies, for the most part, assign 647 area code numbers to cell phones), and it's been reassigned. Cease and desist, and don't call again, or we'll be taking this to small claims court and filing a harassment lawsuit."
"You're just covering up for him!"
"Is that what you think? Call Telus, explain who you are, and ask them if the number has been reassigned if I'm lying. At any rate, don't call again."
"Are you sure?"
"Uh huh."
"Oh...okay. Thank you very much, sir! Govern yourself accordingly." *CLICK*
I love "govern yourself accordingly." What does that mean? It means "do whatever you want because we don't have any real authority."
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