Re: Cable collections aka Money, Money, Money
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Posted by Judgmental
(12.228.105.154) on January 12, 2004 at 08:59:42:
In Reply to: Cable collections posted by Andrea on January 12, 2004 at 08:09:56:
Short Answer:
It's up to the creditor to decide when they send your account to collections--whether that be an internal collection department with a different DBA name or a 3rd party collection agency. They are not obligated to give you a grace period, repayment terms or anything else. If they want to wield the hammer hard and fast, they can do that. Who is the collection agency? The debt is most likely assigned and not sold considering the timespan you've mentioned. Can you afford to pay up? If so, negotiate for a deletion. Tell Comcast you'll pay in full directly to Comcast if the collection entry is deleted. Get this in writing, of course. Long Answer:
You should not expect original creditors to act in the same way that they did when the economy was booming. You could get away with a lot more then because money was flowing and there was no sense of urgency. Ever since the economy and the stock market went southward, creditors have been really feeling the pinch. Everyone is cutting costs and trying to maximize returns. Late payments and defaults are up, so collections are up. And, they know that whoever does the most damage to the consumer (disconnections, ruined credit, annoying phone calls, etc) will get paid first. I've seen this play out in my own finances and business relationships. Creditors are quick to send you to collections, because they believe there's good chance that you will not pay up with out pressure. I have Comcast in Washington State and I simply moved from one unit to another in the same building. Even though I had opened a new account prior to closing the previous service address, Comcast still sent me a dunning letter! The accounts had OVERLAPPED and they STILL sent the stupid dunning letter! Unbelievable! It seems to be part of their policy these days. I also had another stupid, "You pay now!," experience with Comcast. They were insisting that I owed them money for a bill at an address in another state from YEARS AGO. I explained to them that I did not live at that address and didn't owe them anything. The rep's response was that I should send them proof of where I lived at the time the debt was incurred. I had to write them a letter to burst their bubble and let them know that I was not under obligation to prove that I didn't owe them any money and since they had admitted to having zero proof of the debt, they had to let the matter go. They folded like a deck of cards. Insanity. They are trying to get paid and they don't care how or by whom, for that matter.
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