I'm a newbie here, and wish I had found this board sooner!

I am in the process of repairing my credit score (614). I have 3 negative items impacting negatively on my scores at this time. From the wealth of information on this board, I have good ideas how to proceed with two of them . But the third is vexing me! Here's the situation:

Federal Perkins Loans (2), defaulted in April 2001.
Balance of two loans was $3100, was told this would become $4100 with collection fees.

First notice from the CA came in July 2001 for $4100. In 2002, these notices changed to $5400. I was alarmed and discussed this with CA on the phone (my first contact), and also the School (OC) and got them to "fix it" back to $4350 in June 2004.

Never validated or anything (if I only knew then…!)

Paid $800 and $1500 in July 2004 and August 2004, respectively. Subsequent letters from the CA seem to have added more to the balance since then (arbitrary fees? Or do they assume I wouldn't notice? )

By my calculations I should owe $1800 more to settle the account ($4100 - $800 - $1500). CA is suggesting that my balance is $2300. OC (School, contacted by email) says they no longer have anything to do with the account.

On my CR, the loans show up multiple times (the total I've been using is the sum of two Perkins loans, but there are 5 TLs on the CR)

My goals here are (1) fix my credit and (2) see the School gets paid fairly.

I am considering sending the CA a PFD for an amount between the $1800 I calculate and the $2300 they invented -- maybe $1900. However, even if they agree to this, won't the Collection status TLs from the School still remain? Does the CA have the ability to delete all pertinent TL's? I can't tell which (if any) originated from the School, and which from the CA. Should I send a validation request first, or is it useless (since I've already began paying them)?

Any thoughts or suggestions would be welcome -- and thanks in advance!

YOu can still DV and go for the 1-2 punch. If they can validate then you try PFD.

OK, so DV is my first step. If they validate correctly, and I try a PFD, can I insist that they remove all TLs related to the loans? Do they have the power to do that? Again, I'm not sure how to tell if the TLs were reported by the school or the CA, I am assuming both have. All 5 give the OC (school) address.

This is quite different as it is a STUDENT LOAN. You would do best to have this moved to the Student Loan forum where you will get better answers, but the long & short of it is, you don't really want or need to DV for a Perkins loan because they WILL be able to validate. You're dealing with the US government on this one, and I've never heard of a case where they couldn't validate.

If you defaulted on the loan, the $500 difference is likely the fees associated with that default. Again, there isn't a lot of negotiation room on a Student Loan like there is with other unsecured debt. I would suggest you read the Student Loan forum thoroughly and then determine your course of action.

Don't try a 1-2 punch with this ... it won't do you any good and you will have wasted a lot of time and money. You can request a statement of account from the CA, detailing all of the charges, but you're not going to get very far with your current plan.

Again, all the rules change when you're dealing with Student loans. Good luck!

Moving to student loan forum.

Generally the collection agencies will waive collection fees if you settle out he account with one payment, however they do have to get permission from the school do do this. Since you didnt settle it, they have added the fees back on. Technically they are under no obligation whatsoever to discount these fees, since in your original contract you agreed to all costs applicable.

Call the CA and ask them or a payment history from the school. They should have no problem getting it for you.