Trying to fix a medical bill collection.

[ams1slc]

Sorry but I tried to do a search for my particular circumstance and I couldnt find anything so this seems to be the place to ask.

I had surgery last year and I paid my deductable and copays but there was a deductable from the anestesiologist that I never knew about.....a 900 freaking dollar deductable. Anyways, I didnt even know about it until two days ago when I ran my credit on Freecreditreport.com. I saw that it was in collections and freaked.....couldnt imagine what the bill was for. I called the collections agency today and they forwarded me to the attorneys office handling the case. I told them I would wire transfer them the money right away but what about my credit. They said theres nothing they can do about that. They said they will update it to "Paid collection in full". I told the girl not good enough, I didnt realize I even owed the money. I explained to her that the hospital billing was a ridiculous nightmare as it was....every single bill came from a different billing department and they all had different account numbers, there was no way I could keep up with it and that I never recieved anything from the anestesiologists office in regards to it.

I asked again, please......I'll pay the balance in full, just send me notice that you will remove it from my credit.

She claimed that the FTC under the Fair Credit Reporting Act only allows collection agencies to remove items from your credit under two circumstances;

1)You pay the debt before you are contacted by the collections agency

2)The credit reporting was done in error.

She said Im outa luck cause she claims they sent several notices to both my work and home address and complied with reporting requirements and that Im not disputing that the bill is mine.

So paying the debt does nothing to remove it from or otherwise help my credit. My credit score dropped 80 points just from that notice.

Is she correct? Are they prevented under the FCRA from removing this from my credit?

[30daylate]

She is wrong. hold out until you can talk to someone who knows what they are talking about.

[Lian]

It is NOT illegal for a debt collector to delete their collection from your CR in exchange for your payment. It is done all the time,thousands of times a day.

It is the standard pay-for-deletion (PFD) process.

Unfortunately, acceptance of a PFD is solely at the discretion of the creditor/debt collector. And they have legitimate grounds for refusal. Evey party who reports to a CRA enters into a reporting agreement with the CRAs, one condition of which is that the party agrees not to delete prior, accurate reporting on the basis of payment of the debt.

No, it is not illegal or prevented under the FCRA, but yes, it is technically a violation of their reporting agreements.

[ntnsllc]

the thing that stands out most in my mind is the fact that she claimed to fw you to the "attorney's" office. Most of these collection agencies are NOT attorneys. They cannot claim to be someone they are not. I sued a CA who claimed he was with the "Law Offices of...." some dude's name. He was NOT. I sued them and they ended up settling for 5 figures PLUS extinguishing of the debt and a court order to remove the entry on my credit report.

So two things...likely the CA is breaking the law. And second they CAN and WILL remove the entry. What you should do is send them a notice that you aren't sure that you owe the money because your records indicate it was paid. Ask them to verify that you owe the debt.

The other thing I've done successfully is just sent a check to the original creditor (in my case it was a Dr. as well!) The memo on the check said "Acct ### Paid in Full with this payment." They cashed the check. Then I sent a DV (debt validation) letter to the CA. When they tried to validate the acct. the OC reported it paid. This only works if the CA has NOT purchased the account. So you'll need to ask them if it's been purchased or if they are just an assigned collector working on behalf of the hospital...which they probably are. If they did "purchase" the debt, this won't work. Go with the first option...ask them to verify/validate the debt is yours.

Sorry...long post, but you are being LIED to. These collectors KNOW the laws. They're lying to you and if they're misrepresenting who they are, find an attorney, tell your story and let them handle it. My attorney charged me nothing out of pocket, but did take 50% of the settlement! Which is fair because I had no money up front to pay him anyway.