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Hi! I have been without a job for close to 3 years and I stopped making payments on some of my accounts in 2013. I have: 1. HSBC $430 2. Capital One $1800 3. Citi $6800 I finally got a job and I am ready to pay off my debts but i want to be smart about it. HSBC and Capital One were sold to Portfolio Recoveries Associate. I talked with them and they were just nasty and agressive and tried to force me to give them my checking/saving account numbers which I refused. They offered a miserable settlement on HSBC account for $340. I asked to do pay for delete and they refused. What should I do? Citi account is in collections but it's not on my credit report. Should I call citi directly? Other than that, my credit is OK. I have Amex in good standing, paid car loan and a bunch of good cards. I just want some advice from anyone who dealt with Portfolio Recoveries Associate.

First, a little bit background of me: male, in early 30s, in good financial conditions, earning around 130K per year. I am always very careful of about my credit history, never missed a payment to credit card, car loan, utilities company. I check credit report regularly and the score is always at the high end of 700. However, chocolate still happens. One year ago, I made an unfortunate decision of joining a nearby gym before checking any Yelp review. Immediately after that, we have a lot of disputes over its billing. I don't want to go over all the details, it would be too long and boring. Anyway, I stopped going there several months ago. I thought they would call me or mail me if they want to solve the issue, but they never did (they have my phone number and address). Two week ago, I got a regular mail (not certified) from a collection agency, claiming I owe them 200 bucks. The mail states that I have 30 days to dispute the amount, otherwise they will assume it is valid, blah, blah, blah... To be honest, I am willing to pay 200 bucks just to make the problem go away, but I want to listen to some expert's opinion before doing that. First of all, is it possible the collection will be shown on the credit report? They have my address and phone number, but not SSN. I subscribe to the credit monitoring service and so far there is nothing. I am also curious what kind of business could potentially put a collection item on my credit report? Think about it, it's scary that if a local coffee shop could put a collection on your report if they think you owe them 5 bucks. Second of all, what should I do? (a) pay them directly; ( write to the collection agency, dispute the amount; © do nothing. I am inclined to do (a), which seems to be hassle-free, but am afraid that will make lose any negotiating power if a collection item eventually show up on the credit report. Thank a lot of reading this. I would really appreciate for any suggestion.

I apologize if this has been answered. I have searched for 3 days now trying to see if I could find a specific answer, I have found similar but not exact. 10/13 I was in an auto accident (which is the reason for the BK now) I was the middle car in the three car accident, my insurance had to pay for my medical bills. There is one bill for 84$ that was not paid. I notified the OC in March 2014 that I intended to file bankruptcy, they made note of it, April 3rd I filed, and the stay letters from BK court were sent out. Fast forward to June 9, 2014 a collection shows up on my credit report for $84.00 and tanks my already credit score by about 30 points moving me from one credit level down to another. I contact the OC and she tells me she received notice of my bk filing but until its discharged they continue collection activities. Does that defeat the purpose of the stay? She forwarded my bankruptcy information to the collection agency and now it reports as a collection in bk status and updated today to bk discharged. If they filed the collection after the bk was filed isn't that a violation? How can I get them to remove that collection from the reports? I have been reading Whychat's HIPPA guide but since I do not owe this bill as it has been discharged by chap 7 bk, and it is being reported after the bk was filed I am unsure what direction to proceed. Again sorry if this has come up before, I searched and could not find a specific answer. Thank you for any help.

I have a hospital bill of $3500. Collection has been disputed and verified. I have been paying off and on, when I have the money, for two years (to the hospital ONLY). My husband and I both acquired second jobs and we are now ready to tackle this collection and get it off my CR. We will have all of the money by April of next year at the latest. My Questions: Should I just save up the money and make one payment to the OC with the HIPAA letter? OR Should I start paying what I gather monthly to the OC and make the last payment using the HIPAA letter? My fear is the hospital suing me for the money before I get all of it together. I will have over $1000 by August to put towards this bill. I have already tried to talk to the hospital about retracting the bill from the CA once it's paid off, but they refuse. This is my last doctor bill from my hospital stay and of course my biggest. Thank you in advance!

Hey guys, well this one is probably going to get a couple and and yes, I deserve them. BUT, paying parking tickets was the last thing on my mind as I was making my way through midterm and final after final. Now they're killing my credit and I obviously regret it. I just thought, they'll go away and I'll never see them again. They didn't. 5 years later, I have 12 parking tickets on my TU report (not listed on the others, just TU) and each line looks like this: INNOVATIVE COLLECTIONS #000000000 Placed for collection: 12/28/2009 Responsibility: Individual account Loan Type: Collection Agency/Attorney Balance: $95 Balance updated: 10/25/2011 Past due: $95 This is KILLING my TU score. I've offered to pay them (PFD) but they actually said no. Now, I just want them off and I'll do anything you guys think might work. Has anyone had a similar experience? What method do you think would work on parking tickets? THANKS!!

I had a medical emergency in 2009 and was in Hospital 3 times in one month, for the 1st time in my life. I almost hemorraghed to death. Dr put me on 30 days bedrest to heal. During that time I could not work and spent my savings surviving. I rented a Condo for 6 years. First years rent was $700 mo. This medical emergency happened at beginning of 7th year (2010) and rent was jacked up to $995 mo. I notified Management Company I was going to be late with rent, they requested medical documents. I provided documents, got email saying they understood, would give me more time and reduce rent back down to $750 for the coming year. I waited, waited. No new lease in mail as promised. I emailed Mgmt Co got reply "Out of Office" I waited. Instead I got served with eviction notice. Realizing they were playing dirty, I took them to Court and won 1st round, staying in my Condo. Went back to work. I was almost 1 mo behind. I dropped off rent and they would not accept it. Got another eviction notice. Went to Court and lost.They lied in Court. I was forced to leave on short notice, put my stuff in storage and lived in my car temporarily. I still had key to mailbox so got my mail from the outside box because I didnt know what to do or where to go. 3 months later I found a room to rent in a private Home. My new address was on my credit report since 2010. I never got any further mail from Management Company.They could have easily found me by doing a websearch or credit check. I read lawbooks for my state, they had 6 months to provide me a final accounting after inspecting the place or for any charges due. For 6 years I kept that place in model home condition. It was same when I left. I noticed Condo was vacant for 6 months. I have copies of my credit reports every 6 months for the past 8 years. Guess what I found today? A $10,000 Collection Agency acct from Management Company, BACKDATED to 2010. I'm about to have a nervous breakdown....how can they do this 4 years later and post it like its been on there all along? Now what do I do?

does anyone know what "skip? means? Its not like I skipped out on the debt- was at same address for 40 years...

Hi All, Im hoping someone can provide me some guidance here.. I had an old account from Juniper from 2006. I had 2 CA's (LHR and Ascension) trying to collect on this in my report. I DV'd both of them last month and disputed with the CRA's and the entries are now off my Credit Reports. However, I received 2 letters from one of the CA's (Ascension) attempting to validate this debt. They included the ff. information per my DV letter: Original Creditor: Juniper Bank Current Owner of Account: Ascension Services Ascension ID: 114xxxxxxx (listed their ID i just x'd out some info intentionally) Original Account Number: 5148xxxxxxxxxxxxx (listed full account number) Last Payment Date at creditor: 4/16/07 Open Date: 10/26/06 Principal Balance: $1,162 Interest Balance: $1,170 Total Balance: $2.332 it is signed as: Respectfully, Customer Services Ascension Services, LP The original DV letter I sent last month listed my current address on the header yet they sent the 2 letters as a response to my parents old house in Illinois which they no longer live in for about 9 months. The post office forwarded the letters to my parents new home in PA which they then forwarded to me in CA. The DV letter i sent explicitly and clearly listed my new address in California which i told them to use for any correspondence with me yet they sent 2 response letters to my parents old home that i have not lived in for over 15 years!! Are they intentionally doing this for some reason?? My questions are: - Is this debt out of SOL and can they legally report it again to reflect in my CR's? (Debt was incurred while living in Illinois. I have since moved to California since 2011.) - Are they able to sue me for this debt? - What can i do to prevent these guys from coming after me again? Any insights or advice you guys can provide would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your help!

Hi Friends. My FICOs were 810, 805, 795 in Oct 2013. Now they are 684, 690, 790. Five years back I terminated my cellphone service with TMobile after paying Early Termination Fee(ETF) and final payment of $200 + $42 which was paid as a final settlement. I got ATnT service with a new phone number. After termination of the service TMobile system erroneously generated a bill for the next month for $42. I tried to access my TMobile online account but it was already disabled after my final payment of $242. So I called the Customer Service Representative (CSR) and explained the situation. I remember that at the end of the call the CSR agreed to make corrections in their system. Within a month I had to move to a new place for my job. ( i.e. I changed my phone number and my address, but TMobile still had my email address). No communication received from TMobile after I moved even though I had forwarded my mail through USPS to the new address. In December 2013, Enhanced Recovery (CA) reported a collection account on Experian and Equifax. They updated it as 'past due' since Jan 2014. This account will fall off in Mar 2016. No communication in any form ever received from Enhanced Recovery Corporation. I found my dream home and wanted to apply for mortgage and that's why i ordered my Credit Reports and found out about this account. I discovered CreditBoards through google and read as many posts as possible in the last 8 hours. I learned a lot from the forum posts but I am still unclear about the correct strategy to get this account deleted. Hence I am requesting you guys for guidance. One more thing, although I did settle the account with TMobile, as of now I have no documents or emails to support my claim. I tried to login into my TMobile account again today but it is still disabled. Any help, comments and opinions is highly appreciated. Thank you for reading. TL;DR : New Collection account showed up on EX and EQ because of a wrongly generated bill by TMobile after service termination. Need to get rid of the collection as applying for mortgage.

So I won a default judgement from a JDB who made the mistake of reporting to my bureau, they failed to notate and continued collection activity after failing to validate, so I sued them in NM Small Claims, I won by default and the 30 day period they could have appealed has passed. Now I have to apply for a writ of execution, that apparently they still have 10 more days to file for a motion to be "exempt", I'll have to serve this summons... more fees sigh. I'm not disclosing the name of the JDB just yet, but I'm looking for resources to help me with the collection of this judgement... The JDB is in Texas. What I'm looking for is... what's the process is in Texas with a foreign writ. I spoke with the constable's office and they said they would execute the writ (but didn't know if they could execute a foreign writ) and "scare" em, and they will usually cough up a check but that they can't take any property that is "used for their daily business", so computer's and desks, etc. can't be grabbed unfortunately. As I understand it: I need to make this application for writ of execution in NM *Get the summons issued by the NM court *Serve the new summons on them *They'll have 10 days to respond with a "exempt" status and a hearing would be set or else the writ will be issued. *(Side note: I'm reading the application and it states I must choose one of three statements... [ ] I served the judgment debtor with a notice of right to claim exemptions more than ten (10) days prior to filing this application for writ of execution and the judgment debtor has not filed a claim of exemption for the property to be seized and sold.1 [ ] The judgment debtor has filed a waiver of the right to claim exemption for the property to be seized and sold.2 [X] The judgment debtor is not a natural person. Since they are a corporation, I might not have to serve them the notice of rights From here I get fuzzy... Can I use the NM writ with the constable in Texas? or do I have to domesticate the writ? If I have to domesticate it, can I do that pro se or will I need an attorney in Texas, as I understand Small Claims in Texas TOTALLY changed last year. Then I need to find their new physical address for the constable as I think they've moved and their address and websites are in flux... And of course finding a bank account would be glorious! (does anyone know of a database out there with dirtbag collector asset info?) ANY help would be really awesome.

Hello everyone, On my credit report there are some old credit cards where my last payment made was in 2007 and they went to collection. Now those same accounts where sold to LVNV and Midland and they are showing balances that are more than double what the actual balances were and they show those accounts as being opened in 2011 with them. I also noticed that they say they are a factoring company. I have never sent a payment after 2007 so they cant say I restarted the clock and also I am in Florida. What is the best way to dispute this with the credit bureau. I really do appreciate any help. Thank you Points 1) I have the original creditor showing a charge off in the amount of $xxxx with a last payment date of 2007. 2) collection company is not linking their account to the original creditor and showing a much higher balance with a date account opened in 2011 which makes it look newer and like a different account all together..

I need some help from the expert CBers. DH has a year old collection from a Cap1 that had a limit of 300. I'm not sure about the DOFD. The balance being reported to the CRAs is $555 (late fees in all). We are trying to buy a house this year and I want to take care of this in the best way possible. Should a DV letter be sent to Cap1? I'm pretty sure I read on here that Cap1 doesn't PFD. Please help.

Hi, I have an old BOA card that defaulted in 2008- it was sold to a collection agency- FIC i think was the name . Then it was resold in 2012 to Calvary Portfolio and is showing as a new account instead of the 2008 date. How do i go about clearing this up because I can wait for it to drop off if the actual default date gets listed.

Hello everyone. A little over a year ago I stopped paying on my Discover account, which had a balance of over $9,000. I was working with a credit mediation company which Discover did not work with, so they charged off my balance without notice. A few months later I got a call from Zwicker & Associates, advising that they are collecting on my Discover debt that was charged off, and advising that I owe the $9,xxx.xx that was charged off. I did some research on Zwicker and found that they were sue-happy, and that several people that were sued by Zwicker were forced to go into bankruptcy. That was the last thing I needed, so my parents offered to loan me $5,000 so I could work out payment arrangements with Zwicker. I called Zwicker back and tried to negotiate a lower balance, before offering them the $5,000. They advised that they could offer me a lower balance of $6,xxx.xx (I forget the exact number), but told me if I agreed on that lesser balance that it would reflect negatively on my credit report because they told me it would show that I did not pay the balance in full. So I gave them the $5,000 and worked out monthly payments with them for roughly 12 months to pay off the rest of the balance in full. I recently started using USAA credit monitoring service, and became curious as to how the debt is showing on my credit report. There is currently nothing from Zwicker showing, only Discover. Discover shows up as a charge-off: Now, since I only just started using this monitoring service, I'm not sure if that $988.00 balance has been going down each month with my payments. I tried calling Zwicker this morning too see my balance with them was the $988.00 that I am seeing here on my Discover account, but Zwicker is apparently closed on Saturday's. So now to my question. Since I have, at this point, exceeded the negotiated balance I initially discussed with Zwicker, is it doing me any good to continue paying them the remainder of my balance if we can re-negotiate the lower balance again? Or am I safe to try to negotiate what I've given them so far as my final balance, and walk away if they agree to it? Is there any true benefit to paying the rest of the balance in full?? The reason I ask is because my next goal in life is to get my credit score and history back up and in order, so I can buy my first house in a year or so. I have some other debts that will be paid off in a few more months that have been impacting my credit scores, and I am hoping that a quick re-score will help out with things. But if I negotiate on a lower balance than whatever is left on this charge-off, will that reflect whatsoever on my ability to get approved for a mortgage, or will it impact my credit score/history negatively in any way? Additionally, once paid off (either at the full amount or at a lower, negotiated amount)... is there any way to remove this from my credit report? Discover told me they are not allowed to remove it (even though I told them it is only optional for them to have posted it in the first place, and they can remove it at their own will without any penalties to them), and they won't even discuss it further with me since the debt is no longer in their hands. Any suggestions?? Thank you!!

Hi, guys, So I got some wonderful news yesterday. I happened to call Experian to cancel their free trial credit monitoring and they talked me into another free month. I said okay, and just out of curiosity checked my report again. It was about five weeks since the last time I checked it and I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was free of baddies. I’d had been working hard since November on five medical collections (same CA), one paid tax lien and one paid civil judgment. I tried to GW the OC on the judgment but after trying to reach out to them twice with no reply, I decided to take a break and figure out what my next step would be. I’d also asked the IRS to remove the paid lien from my report – they do that now, but it’s apparently not guaranteed for everyone who applies. I knew that was going to be a longer process, so I decided to settle in and wait. So when I checked my credit report yesterday the lien was gone and the judgment was gone. Whaaat? I called the IRS to inquire about the status of my request and the woman I talked to said the removal had been approved but they were still working on it. The way it was explained to me, I'd have to take documents they would send me to my county court/clerk and ask to have the lien removed, but it seems they're ahead of me somehow. Also, I had disputed the five medical collections and four were deleted rather quickly but the one for the largest amount ($1600) came back verified. So I was preparing WhyChat’s HIPAA letter as my next step, but when I checked my credit report yesterday that one was gone too! I mean, it had been due to age off the report next year so maybe they’re early? I’m not complaining. Is all of this too good to be true? I am planning to purchase my three reports in about a month to double-check this fantasy. If it is indeed true and they're all gone for good, I think I would be able to begin to rebuild. I have one Cap 1 Secured CC (just over a month old). I’ll use that for a three months or so and then beg them for a CLI (limit is now $400). After that, any advice? I’m not sure what the ideal number of cards is to have (I don't want a lot) or which banks would be best to try for. Can you guys suggest which cards I should try for and how long I should wait before applying? Right now I'm thinking to wait for about 6 months so my secured CC can some good reporting. Is that a good plan? Thanks in advance for any advice, and thanks for all the invaluable advice you’ve provided to me over these two months of my lurking and posting. I know I wouldn’t have been able to get to this point without the fantastic support from CBers and I can’t thank you all enough.

Okay, Fingerhut sold account to CA. I am settling with CA for 40% and they claim that They will not report that to Fingerhut. How do I get rid of OC on report? No PFD avail through CA (midland) and not paying whole balance. Tried to get Fingerhut to recall, no luck Any words if wisdom?

Hello, I had posted this over at a military-specific forum, and some of the folks there suggested I post here for additional insight. I'm in the process of re-enlisting. My packet is completed, and I'm due to enter a critical rating in the Navy Reserves. I have served before, and left to build a civilian career and a family. The career has given me a decent income, and the family has given me the need to have a dependent waiver put in at CNRC for approval. The waiver was an absolute non-issue, since the family income is good, and the debt is low. My credit record had one negative entry, a bankruptcy from nine years ago. Since then, the payment history shows as excellent, with no misses or lates. Since I'm finalizing my packet this coming week, I decided to see what my actual FICO credit score was. In running the report, I saw a new account (as of February 2014) that I didn't recognize - an open collection account for 400.00 (a cellular phone account). After almost losing my lunch, I reached out to the collector and got as much information on the account as possible, then put in a dispute with them. I then contacted the original creditor, which was able to confirm the amount and nature of the account, but nothing further. The address matched mine, but the account was one I never opened. Once I verified that I hadn't completely lost the plot and dropped the ball on a responsibility, I put in a dispute with all three credit reporting bureaus. My fear is that this fresh account will end my re-enlistment. Other than that entry, I'm a strong candidate thanks to fitting in a critical rating (which requires TS clearance - though I imagine this dispute will be cleared in my favor by the time I have my interview) which is significantly undermanned thanks to my civilian work history and education. My question is, how can I mitigate the entry? It has impacted my FICO score by approximately 40 points, but most importantly, without explanation, it looks like I just didn't pay a bill and wasn't responsible. I know there is a comment/explanation field on the dependent waiver form, but I'm not sure that anyone will take into account the nature of the entry, and the fact that it is in dispute and is not a valid debt. My income shows that the issue isn't that I cannot pay the debt - I absolutely pay all my bills on time, as my payment history shows. I am just at a loss of how to get the message to the approval authority, so that they understand that this is out of character and is simply not my collection. For the first time in my life, I feel absolutely defeated, and anticipate the worst. Re-entering the military concurrent with an established civilian career was something I've intended to do for years, and the time was right. I really appreciate any advice/experience the community can provide.

I recently successfully disputed a medical collection, and when I pulled my updated reports, I noticed that another collection was gone as well. Checking back, it was also missing from the reports I pulled to initiate the dispute (12/31/13). This seems rather odd to me, since it definitely is NOT dropped off (DOFD is about 3-4 years ago). It was on my reports with all 3 CRAs as of 5/13 So, in summary: 1/13 - present all 3 5/13 - present all 3 12/13 - gone all 3 now - gone all 3 I am definitely not complaining to have a collection off my reports, but I'm a bit concerned it might suddenly show up again. Does anyone have any insight into what might have happened here? Or suggestions about what, if anything, I should do? If it matters, CA was EOS, OC was ATT

Just had to share: I started with the pre-HIPAA, as WhyChat says, just around a month ago, after having foolishly sent a PFD offer (that was obviously rejected). Should have done it sooner - wish I had known sooner. There was only one collection I was dealing with, and it was reporting as a current/open, so was really hitting my scores pretty bad. TU responded within about 4-5 days with a deletion. Got my EQ and EX responses today - both deleted. Thank you, WhyChat, I would have never known I could even try this without all of your information.

Hi co-signed a lease with an ex boyfriend 6 years ago. He was abusive and one day I left and never came back. I never thought about telling the leasing agency that I left. It was a rough time in my life. My life is on track and I was looking over my credit report and I have debt of $10,000 from that apartment. It has now been sent to a collection agency. I have no clue why or how. It's very possible that my ex boyfriend squatted without paying the rent. I've tried to locate the rental agency but they are no longer where they use to be and I can't remember the name. I have no clue what my next step is. I understand that my name was on the lease and I can be held responsible. Who do I talk to? I'm feeling over-whelmed. Michelle

Hello all, haven't posted here in a good, long while. I'm back to seek some advice. I'm helping my wife repair her credit. There's an account on her Exp report that she needs to deal with - a small medical bill of $298 from 2009 that went into collection in 2010. We were going to use Why Chat's HIPAA letter program to try to deal with this, but there's a notation on her report that the account is in dispute. Just wondering if this "Acct in dispute" notation should be dealt with first (try to get it removed), or does she just proceed with the HIPAA letter process? Thanks!

I sent a debt validation letter to a CA (Enhanced Recovery Services). They sent back the following letter, which first states they can confirm the debt, but then says they will ask for its deletion. Sounds great (I think?) but what I'd like to do is follow up with all of the CRAs by mail to show them that the CA agreed to report it. What I want to know is - Since the letter also says the CA can "confirm" the debt, will the CRAs also consider it valid? I want to make doubly-sure it gets deleted but don't want to shoot myself in the foot my mailing them. ***** LETTER: Our offices are in receipt of your letter of dispute and request for verification pursuant to 15 U.S.C 1692g of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. This letter is a response to your dispute. Please be advised we have contacted our client, who has confirmed the name and address listed on the account as well as the amount owed. Enclosed is a summary of the charges on the account and any billing statements provided by our client that confirm the charges. Please be advised we have reported this debt to consumer reporting agencies, but in acknowledgement of your dispute, we have requested the account be removed from all credit reporting agencies. Consumer reporting agencies may take up to 30 days or longer to update reports and this is beyond our control. Should you have any questions regarding this account or any information provided at this time, please feel free to contact us. Sincerely, Enhanced Recovery Company, LLC This communication is made for the limited purpose of responding to your dispute and is NOT an attempt to collect a debt.

It never ends. Just two days ago I learned that I had gotten some really bad derogs off my report and then today I get a call from an attorney about a medical bill from 2011. Honestly, it was such a bad couple of years for me medically that that I got a ton of complicated and confusing bills but it seemed my insurance took care of it all. I have very good insurance, fortunately, and figured anything that the insurance didn’t pay the hospital would notify me of at some point. Instead of hearing from them, I’m getting calls from an aggressive attorney. Can you guys advise me on how to proceed? The amount is $2,000 and I’d be happy to enter a payment agreement but the attorney’s rep is pushing me to pay a big part of it soon – which I can’t afford. What should I do? I’d much rather deal with the hospital, but is it too late at this point, since they have an attorney calling me? I asked the attorney for a copy of the bill and he said they typically wouldn’t give it to him unless we go into litigation. I’m really not sure what to make of that but I’ll call the hospital first thing in the morning. Can you please help me handle this the right way? I’m just getting started with rebuilding my credit and I’d hate to have all that good work go to waste because I handle this wrong. Thanks so much for all your help.

Hi, guys, I am new to credit awareness and this board but I’ve found your comments tremendously educational and I’m ready to tackle my credit problems. Here’s my situation: I checked my credit report and scores for the first time two weeks ago and this is what I found: Scores: 593; 632; 649. Collections: Several medical bills from 2008 (six for around $200 each). I disputed them online and they were actually deleted! Whoa. It works. There is another collection for $1500 that wasn’t deleted and was updated last month. It’s from the same CA as the other smaller ones that were, so I’m not sure of my next step. I don’t want to do anything to cause them to re-add those other ones. Should I HIPAA the CRAs first or the CA? Derogatory/Public Records: 1 IRS tax lien, satisfied in 2011. They now have a program where they will remove liens from public records and I applied for that last week. Fingers crossed. There’s also a default civil judgment from 2010 which I’ve also paid. Should I try a GW letter to the OC or their attorney? Or GW letter to the CRAs? I actually don’t remember being served this lawsuit (hence the default judgment) but I’m going to go the courthouse and check the record of how they served. Maybe they served a past address and maybe that would be grounds to have it vacated. It’s a long shot, I know. That’s it for negatives. As for positives, I have one car loan that I got 2 ½ years ago. The interest rate is 17 percent but I wasn’t going to get a better offer and I needed a car as my old one had died. I wouldn’t be able to refinance because I owe less than $7,000 on the loan. I hadn’t credit card in 10 years. I got used to paying in cash and thought that was good but I realize that I cannot opt-out of the credit-based society because it’s counting against me in so many ways. So I applied for a Capital One secured card two weeks ago and have a $350 limit. I had applied for a Barclays credit card but was declined. I am going to use the Capital One responsibly for four months and then try again for another credit card if my scores go up appreciably. Is it realistic of me to expect to get a real CC so soon with the judgment and single medical collection on my CR? I expect the lien will be removed. Any advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated. I’ve learned so much reading your forums. Thanks!

I just received a call from Financial Asset Management systems saying that I was involved in a hit and run a year and a half ago and I now owe State Farm $2,600. I need help in figuring out if this is a scam or not. Here are some facts: *According to them, I opened my door and dinged an emergency vehicle, then drove away. I have no recollection of this incident whatsoever, and unless someone in my family took my car without my knowledge, I'm 99.99% sure this did not happen. *The vehicle owner filed a claim with their insurance (State Farm) and State Farm took care of the damages. Again, I was never notified until almost a year and a half later. If they had my vehicle description, wouldn't I have been notified by the police? *Now State Farm is "allegedly" using the debt collector to settle the debt from me in the tune of $2,600. *I have the option to make monthly payments OR if I make a lump sum payment, I get a % discounted and I only need to pay $1,800. (this part seems fishy) *They gave me a police report number, and I gave it to my cousin (who is a cop) but I haven't heard back on that yet. The name of the company is Financial Asset Management systems inc. I see a lot of complaints on ripoff report, but it still seems like a legitimate debt collecting firm. Can someone please offer some advice? I really don't want this to be on my credit report if I don't pay, but I shouldn't have to pay for something I didn't do. What are my rights for something like this?