[UnJay]

Today I got served with papers notifying me that "YOU ARE HEREBY NOTIFIED that you are required to appear in person or by attorney..." in Flagler County, FL... "for a pretrial conference before a Judge at this Court." I gathered from this wording and the fact that it goes on to say "THE CASE WILL NOT BE TRIED AT THE CONFERENCE, BUT MAY BE MEDIATED AT THAT TIME" that this is not a trial but just a 'pretrial conference'. A few lines down from that, it reads "The defendant(s) must appear in court on the date specified in order to avoid a default judgement. The Plaintiff(s) must appear to avoid having the case dismissed for lack of prosecution."

The claim seems to originate from a Household Bank Credit Card. This was from a period of time(early'04) about which my memory is still very blurry, as my father died in March of '04 and I was out of Florida for many months after that and really didn't 'get back into the swing of things', for many months thereafter. I had thought I took care of all my debts, but I guess this one slipped by me. According to one of the papers in the bundle which was 'served' upon me today, "Defendant's last payment on Account#**************** was on February 27, 2004." This is contained within the papers that the Plaintiff themselves has provided. This is occurring in Florida, and my understanding from reading some of the threads here is that the SoL on credit card debt in FL is 4 years, which would make the SoL cutoff 2/27/08(but have also seen it described as 5 years for 'written contracts'). From a day's worth of research, I was unable to come to a steadfast conclusion on which would be applicable to the debt I'm being sued for, but, if the 4 year SoL applies, I would anticipate that this would be a potential grounds for dismissal.

One question I have is whether the date the lawsuit was filed matters in terms of the SoL, or whether its strictly about the length of time between the last payment and the present date. Is the fact that it is now past the 4-year SoL significant or might that not matter if the Plaintiff filed(or tried to file?) a suit(or something? - see below) with the court on a date prior to 4 years after the last payment? I ask this because one of the papers in the bunch that was delivered to me today has been labeled with what would seem to be an exceedingly old date(8/10/07) stamped onto it as part of a stamping that resembles the following:

FILED IN THE OFFICE OF THE
CLERK OF CIRCUIT COURT
Flagler County, Florida

AUG.10 2007

By__________Deputy Clerk
Paper No.______________

There is nothing on the two blank lines, no signature, no initial, no 'Paper No.' is identified, but the same case # is written above the stamp that is used on the other pages I received regarding this matter. 8/10/07 would be inside of the 4 year SoL according to the date identified by the plaintiff themselves, as described above. A more recent date(5/5/08) is identified on the prior page, next to an official-looking stamp bearing the name of the Clerk of Courts with a signature. 5/5/08 would fall outside the SoL, but 8/10/07 would not. If neither of these dates matter, and only the present date(7/1/08) or the date of the pretrial conference(7/18) where this matter will be addressed matters, then this matter lies outside the SoL as well. I would appreciate any input that might shed some light on these matters.

Another thing that I find a bit puzzling about this lawsuit is that it is for a total of $844.39. That seems an exceedingly small sum for them to go after considering the plaintiff Attorney's offices are in Miami, hundreds of miles away from Flagler County. Just the gas to pay to come up here and show up for the pretrial conference would knock a pretty big chunk out of anything they recover, even if I paid them in full. If they're hiring a local lawyer to stand in for them, that still seems to stretch the imagination as to why they'd go to all that trouble for $844.39, even considering that they identify another $750.00 as a "reasonable attorney's fee."("In the event this matter is resolved by way of default a reasonable attorney's fee would be $750"). Indeed, the small amount they are seeking to recover puts me in a bit of a no-man's land as I don't really think it'd be worth it to hire my own lawyer, who might charge me a few hundred dollars or more to keep from having to pay the full $844.39, which I still might have to pay. Add that to the lack of demonstrable evidence supporting the plaintiff's claims in the papers I received and the SoL issue and I think its worth the risk of defending myself. They included in the packet of papers what appears to be a very poor-quality copy of the original credit agreement, which did NOT show any evidence of my signature. They also included copies of the contracts between the different parties who have bought and sold the debt over the last few years, which demonstrates that this plaintiff is at least 3 or 4 steps removed from the original creditor, so I doubt they have the original documents at hand and would be hard pressed to go to the trouble to get them just for $844.39. I suspect it is all a big bluff. I wouldn't be surprised if nobody showed up to the pretrial conference on the plaintiff side. Thank you in advance for any input and/ oradvice regarding how I should go about defending myself in this matter that anyone might feel like sharing with me.

[eawoodall]

GO to court.

Ask the judge.

If you don't go they win by default! Whatever they ask for!

[UnJay]

Yeah, I was planning on going to court for sure. I'm wondering if anyone out there has any experience with getting sued for such a small amount. I'd appreciate if anyone who does might want to share their experience with me.

[ScottGem]

First, yes, they will go after small sums. Second, as long as the suit is intitiated within the SOL that's what counts. It's the START of legal proceedings that has to happen.

[twinkiedooter]

Do go to court. They probably have a hundred cases set for the same day and being attended to by an "associate" in a local law firm who will be showing up for them. Happens all the time in collection attorney offices. Schedule a slew of cases on the same day and hire a local attorney to stand in for you come court time. When you add up your "small" suit and 10 other small suits, that adds up.