Taking care of Seriously Past Due Collections Properly

[Anonymous]

Hello everyone, here is my story:

I was involved in a car accident about 2 years ago. I was stopped at a red light and rear-ended by another driver (he was only found to be at 75% at fault?).
After almost 10 months, a lawsuit was settled for the accident.

I went to the ER a few times because of the accident while I was waiting for a medical procedure to be done.
The hospital we go to doesn’t really send much for bills, just how much we owe them per month. Due to this, and being away for college during the time, I was never aware of 2 copays ($100 each) that were sent to me.
I am graduating college here soon and wanted to get a credit card to start building some credit (something I know I should have done a long time ago) but was denied.
I now see that there are 2 entries on my report for copays.

They are both showing as:

SOUTHERN CREDIT RECOVERY
Account Type: Collection Department / Agency / Attorney
Balance: $100.00
Date Opened: 8/1/2013
Account Status: Closed
Payment Status: Seriously past due date / assigned to attorney, collection agency, or credit grantor's internal collection department

One of them has a Key Derogatory point on Oct 2013 and the other is Aug 2013, not sure what this is referring to?

I wanted to get both of these items off of my report but want to do it properly. Why do they say that the account is closed?

I have contacted the hospital and they no longer have any records of these copays. Thanks to some help from reading on this forum, I have put together a PFD letter and was going to send one letter per item and wait for a response.
Is this the appropriate approach or is there another way around this?

Thanks!

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hello everyone, here is my story:

I was involved in a car accident about 2 years ago. I was stopped at a red light and rear-ended by another driver (he was only found to be at 75% at fault?).
After almost 10 months, a lawsuit was settled for the accident.

I went to the ER a few times because of the accident while I was waiting for a medical procedure to be done.
The hospital we go to doesn’t really send much for bills, just how much we owe them per month. Due to this, and being away for college during the time, I was never aware of 2 copays ($100 each) that were sent to me.
I am graduating college here soon and wanted to get a credit card to start building some credit (something I know I should have done a long time ago) but was denied.
I now see that there are 2 entries on my report for copays.

They are both showing as:

SOUTHERN CREDIT RECOVERY
Account Type: Collection Department / Agency / Attorney
Balance: $100.00
Date Opened: 8/1/2013
Account Status: Closed
Payment Status: Seriously past due date / assigned to attorney, collection agency, or credit grantor's internal collection department

One of them has a Key Derogatory point on Oct 2013 and the other is Aug 2013, not sure what this is referring to?

I wanted to get both of these items off of my report but want to do it properly. Why do they say that the account is closed?

I have contacted the hospital and they no longer have any records of these copays. Thanks to some help from reading on this forum, I have put together a PFD letter and was going to send one letter per item and wait for a response.
Is this the appropriate approach or is there another way around this?

Thanks!

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The PFD  letters are definitely the best way to go about getting these removed.  

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

The PFD  letters are definitely the best way to go about getting these removed.  

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That’s what I thought I should start out with, I will try to mail the letters tomorrow and hope for the best.
I figured that since they were relatively small amounts, it shouldn’t be that bad of a process.

Once I pay in full, the collection agency can have the entries fully removed correct?

[Anonymous]

i just dealt with southern credit recovery im in louisiana i sent them a Pay for delete letter and the agreed to delete they are normaly hard to deal with and will not except less than the full amount my collection was a from April 2013 for $272 when i paid it and they deleted it my score did not budge good luck

[Anonymous]

if they agree to your PFD they only report on saturdays so it wont get deleted until next saturday mine waas deleted as soon as they reported it 

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

i just dealt with southern credit recovery im in louisiana i sent them a Pay for delete letter and the agreed to delete they are normaly hard to deal with and will not except less than the full amount my collection was a from April 2013 for $272 when i paid it and they deleted it my score did not budge good luck

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I heard they are hard to deal with.....

I did have another one on my report (different agency) that was for about 700. Once that one was removed, my score went up 47 points!

I work about 5 minutes from their office, but I figured it best to just send a letter.

[Anonymous]

i hope your as lucky as me cause in their response letter they said its against thier policy to delete but as a goodwill gesture they did for me 

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

i hope your as lucky as me cause in their response letter they said its against thier policy to delete but as a goodwill gesture they did for me 

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Hmm, were you pretty blunt with your PFD letter that you wanted it deleted or where you a little nicer?

[RobertEG]

My concern is whether their reporting of account status closed references the OC account or their collection.

Since the OC blew you off, I assume they sold the debt to the debt collector?

Reporting a collection as closed means they no longer have collection authority.

However, that would also have requred them to update the amount under their collection to $0, which was not done.

It appears unclear as to whether they are still collecting on or own the debt, and thus whether they can accept payment at this point.

Did you ever send them a DV, and if so, was it timely, and did they ever respond?

[Anonymous]

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@RobertEG wrote:

My concern is whether their reporting of account status closed references the OC account or their collection.

Since the OC blew you off, I assume they sold the debt to the debt collector?

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I am not sure. I can try contacting the hospital once more, but last time she said she couldnt find any records of money that I owe them.

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@RobertEG wrote:

Reporting a collection as closed means they no longer have collection authority.

However, that would also have requred them to update the amount under their collection to $0, which was not done.

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Are you refering to the CA or OC not having authority?

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@RobertEG wrote:

It appears unclear as to whether they are still collecting on or own the debt, and thus whether they can accept payment at this point.

Did you ever send them a DV, and if so, was it timely, and did they ever respond?

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I have not sent a DV letter or have had any contact with them at all about this debt. Should I send a DV letter before I send the PFD?