Originally Posted by
excon
PS> Credit card companies didn't get rich letting people run away with their money.
Good point. Credit card companies get rich by offering many offers of lines of credit to students that are just starting (building credit), but are also usually attending college and not only not making much money, but also borrowing money via student loans as well.
If you're dumb enough to think the credit cards are not sending out these offers seeking maliciously to entrap young people (who usually haven't learned better yet) in a massive net of credit, then you're not as bright as I had originally thought.
Then again you have situations like mine... Where Fleet Bank allowed me to transfer something like a $9,000 balance to their promised 9.99% fixed rate card and then 9 months later sent me a letter stating the interest rate was going up to 19% for NO REASON. They admitted that I had never made a late payment, had not gone over the $15k liimit on the card, or had done anything else that would have triggered a default rate on the account.
Long story short, They were going to screw me (dishonestly and unethically, like most credit card companies do to a LOT of people) and there nothing I could do about it... except NOT PAY.
Yeap, they chose not to keep their end of the "service agreement" to honor a "fixed rate" and therefore I chose not to keep my end of the 'agreement' by repaying the money that they 'loaned' me. The account was charged off and of course sold to a few other collectors of the course of a few years.
A few years later, Class action was brought against Fleet for this. I opted out of the lawsuit primarily because the class included approximately FOUR MILLION people (that's a lot of people getting screwed by a evil, dishonest and unethical credit card company) and the proposed class action settlement was $FOUR MILLION Dolloars!
Lame as hell!
I had a $9,500 balance when Fleet raised the APR from 9.99% fixed to 19%. It really doesn't take more than SIMPLE math to see that a ONE DOLLAR settlement was not enough of a punishment for doing that to FOUR million people. My interest increase ALONE was a MORE than $100 per MONTH.
So, You ARE RIGHT! Credit card companies do not get rich by letting people run away with their money.
THEY GET RICH BE SCREWING EVERYONE AND THEIR BROTHER OUT OF THEIR HARD EARNED MONEY IN ANYWAY THEY CAN... whether that is loading up college students with 15 credit cards when they already are pulling student loans and not even working a full-time job or changing the terms of a credit card after they have you locked in to a $10,000 balance.
You're sympathy for these MULTI-BILLION dollar companies that prey on the folks like us who visit this forum is both disgusting and completely unattractive! I'm think you may need to evaluate which side of 'the force' you're on. Because it appears to me you sympathize with the 'dark side'. :)
Originally Posted by
ScottGem
My problem with your advice here is that you are minimizing the dangers. You are giving false hope to people that they will be able to avoid having their assets seized.
And yet you have gone through my post and pretty much agreed or repeated what I posted..
Let me made this clear... :) If the collector has some kind of "contract" as you state, perhaps that they received from the original creditor, with a signature, etc. and you mentioned perchases, etc. That sounds like more of a solid case to me than what I feel 99% of these cases are.
Scavenger colletors buy these accounts in BULK... by the hundreds or thousands. They usually have NO information other than what they need to mark your credit report and convince you they have your social and address. (most don't even have your birthdate - though that's not hard to find - try searching your name on zabasearch.com)
Therefore, unless incriminating (sorry, lack of better term) information is voluntarily given to the colletor, a judgement will just NEVER come. Such as was the case with my collectors when both sued me and promtply DROPPED the suit as soon as I filed the paperwork showing I'd be in court to defend myself. Those "pots of gold" (as was stated earlier) totalled almost $40,000 together.
I know it doesn't cost $40,000 to bring a law suit, so common sense says that they just flat out did not have a case. This really boils down to common sense guys. We're really starting to split fine hairs here and just getting stupidly anal about the details that most of these folks will never see because of the fact that the scavengers just extremely rarely bring people to court.
Bottom line, they're looking for default judgement... do nothing, and they got it. However, if you fight it and file the needed paperwork with the court... you're likely to fall in the 99 out of 100 that do NOT end up in court.
Sorry, these are just simply the FACTS... like it, or not.