Very recently, a law office contacted me regarding an old (1999) credit card debt and are threatening to sue if the "settlement" offer is not paid in full in two weeks. The settlement is only $100 off the original amount they tell me I owe.
Are they allowed to do this? What should I do?
I don't have that kind of money and they told me I was "hard" to locate. That is untrue as I have a forwarding address everywhere I've moved.
HELP

Yes, they can. Once a judgement has been filed, they also have the right to request a subpoena to liquidate any assets you may have, i.e. checking/savings in an attempt to find recourse. In an extreme cases, you may also witness wage garnishments.

Most likely the statue of limitation is past, a lot depends 1. the state you live in and the time for statue of limitation, and 2. when was the last payment you made on the debt.

If the statue of limitation is past they can't sue you any longer and it is just a bluff. In fact most likely if they could sue you they would have by now.

Rememeber most debt collectors lie to you, we have a saying if their mouh is moving they are lying. They will theaten to call the police on you, to take your car and more.

On a credit card debt that is 9 years old, they most likely should settle for about 25 cents on the dollar, so if the original debt was 1000, they should settle for about 25 cents. Most likely a few things, this is most likely a collectoin company that bought this debt for 2 or 3 cents on the dollar , if the statue of limitation is over. They may have a attorney that works for them, to scare people that don't know better, or in fact it may not even be an attorney and they again are just lying to you.

So if you have not paid on this since 1999 it is doubtful they can get a judgement against you any longer.