What a wonderful day!
I'm only kidding, of course. Today was a bad day in the financial life of Carrie. Of course, I didn't know this until I got off work.
On my way to the daycare, I got a call from a rep at a collection agency. He was calling about an account that I had made payment arrangements on and the check for the final payment was not honoured by my bank. I explained to him that I would call him back when I got home, that I was in the car. He acted like I was just trying to get him off the phone, which I'm sure a lot of people do to collections reps, but I really wasn't in a position to discuss my account. So I told him that I would be home in about 30 minutes, and I would call him, and if he hadn't heard from me in 30 minutes, that he would call me back.
So I pick up Enzo and go home. I get home and my husband asks me to go to our bedroom, where he retrieves some papers and says "This came for you a few minutes ago." I look at it and it's a summons, that a lawsuit has been filed against me in civil court. It's a balance from a credit card, that got referred to a collection agency, and now apparently to a lawyer. I remember the letters from the collection agency a few months ago, that if I didn't make arrangements by x date, it would be referred to an attorney. I tried to contact them, but to no avail. The way their phone system is set up, it doesn't refer you to the first available operator. You have to enter an extension. So I entered the extension from my letter, and it would ring and ring and ring, until I got forwarded back to the main message asking for the extension I was trying to reach. No voicemail. I tried on different days, different times of the day, but the same thing happened each time. I even tried after the supposed "cut-off" date, and the same thing happened. You would think that if they wanted to collect the money that badly, they would make it easier for consumers to reach someone. But that's beside the point. So the last correspondence I received on this was back in September, from the collection agency. I've actually been carrying this notice around in my purse for all these months, so I could try to call from work from time to time. Then today I received the summons. Should the attorney's office not have contacted me prior to filing a lawsuit? I tried to call the attorney's office at the number listed on the summons and left a voicemail.
I am so frustrated at this point. I know that I owe the money, I've had some financial difficulties because of my husband being unemployed for almost a year, and all my other creditors have been understanding and easy to work with. This one agency is impossible to deal with, I can't talk to anyone there, and now I'm being sued. Great. Just fucking great.
I've considered bankruptcy, but I really don't have that much debt at this point, except my student loans, and my student loans wouldn't be covered anyway. I've got just about everyone paid off. My advice for college students: when you're at school, and they set up the booths to apply for credit cards...don't. When I was 18, I had more credit cards than my mother. And now, 10 years later, I'm still paying the price.
On my way to the daycare, I got a call from a rep at a collection agency. He was calling about an account that I had made payment arrangements on and the check for the final payment was not honoured by my bank. I explained to him that I would call him back when I got home, that I was in the car. He acted like I was just trying to get him off the phone, which I'm sure a lot of people do to collections reps, but I really wasn't in a position to discuss my account. So I told him that I would be home in about 30 minutes, and I would call him, and if he hadn't heard from me in 30 minutes, that he would call me back.
So I pick up Enzo and go home. I get home and my husband asks me to go to our bedroom, where he retrieves some papers and says "This came for you a few minutes ago." I look at it and it's a summons, that a lawsuit has been filed against me in civil court. It's a balance from a credit card, that got referred to a collection agency, and now apparently to a lawyer. I remember the letters from the collection agency a few months ago, that if I didn't make arrangements by x date, it would be referred to an attorney. I tried to contact them, but to no avail. The way their phone system is set up, it doesn't refer you to the first available operator. You have to enter an extension. So I entered the extension from my letter, and it would ring and ring and ring, until I got forwarded back to the main message asking for the extension I was trying to reach. No voicemail. I tried on different days, different times of the day, but the same thing happened each time. I even tried after the supposed "cut-off" date, and the same thing happened. You would think that if they wanted to collect the money that badly, they would make it easier for consumers to reach someone. But that's beside the point. So the last correspondence I received on this was back in September, from the collection agency. I've actually been carrying this notice around in my purse for all these months, so I could try to call from work from time to time. Then today I received the summons. Should the attorney's office not have contacted me prior to filing a lawsuit? I tried to call the attorney's office at the number listed on the summons and left a voicemail.
I am so frustrated at this point. I know that I owe the money, I've had some financial difficulties because of my husband being unemployed for almost a year, and all my other creditors have been understanding and easy to work with. This one agency is impossible to deal with, I can't talk to anyone there, and now I'm being sued. Great. Just fucking great.
I've considered bankruptcy, but I really don't have that much debt at this point, except my student loans, and my student loans wouldn't be covered anyway. I've got just about everyone paid off. My advice for college students: when you're at school, and they set up the booths to apply for credit cards...don't. When I was 18, I had more credit cards than my mother. And now, 10 years later, I'm still paying the price.
posted by carrie at 1/12/2005 03:14:00 p.m.
2 Comments:
OH, Carrie, what a nightmare! Sounds like an awful day. I am so sorry. I hope that you are able to work this out quickly and as painlessly as possible.
I got everything with the guy who called straightened out. He's going to re-run that check at the end of the month and then that card will be paid.
As far as this whole lawsuit mess, I hope to hear from the attorney's office tomorrow. If they don't call me, I'm calling them again. We'll see what's going on.
Bankruptcy...I don't think it's the best option for me. I have under $5000 in debt right now, not counting my student loans. I've been working for the last few years to get everything slowly but surely paid off. I don't have any credit cards at the moment, and with the exception of this mess that I'm in as of today, have paid off all but one card that I had in the past.
I was actually feeling pretty good about myself, since I had almost everything paid and was trying to contact this agency to pay this off in installments. That's come crashing down.
One thing I can say about credit cards. That is an excellent business to be in. Maybe I should start a bank and issue cards.
So you get a low interest rate for a few months as a teaser, which promptly shoots up to around 20%. Then you're told that the minimum monthly payment is only $20 or $25, which sounds reasonable enough until you stop and think about the fact that the minimum payment will hardly cover the interest charges, and if you only pay the minimum due, it will take 20 years to pay off a relatively small balance.
And heaven forbid you're late. There's more added on to your balance. Same if you go over your credit limit. One month, I was late on a certain card, and the late fee caused me to go over my limit, so then I got charged an over the limit fee, and then interest on top of it all. Blah.
Publicar un comentario
<< Home