Account sent to collections / time frame requirement?

[Anonymous]

Quick back story, my son was receiving monthly medical services and was covered under his mother's insurance.  I had the bills sent to me for the portion that wasn't covered, typically $50-$100/mo or so that I always paid immediately upon receiving them.  His mother quit her job back in February, losing the insurance, but continued to bring him for services.  I received a bill for around $1000 in early April for "March services", which naturally caught me by surprise.  There were no dates of services on the bill, so I called and asked that documentation be sent to me stating the dates that services were rendered/received.  I never received documentation.  After a little more phone tag with the medical center, I sent them a letter requesting verification of the debt, again by providing me with the dates.  No response to letter 1, so I sent a second letter to which I finally received a response in late May.  It turns out the debt was indeed valid and that my son's mother was BSing me about not taking him for services.  I paid half of the medical bill at the beginning of June and told them I'd pay the remainder at the beginning of July, which didn't sound like it was a problem. 

Anyway, I received a letter from a collection agency today stating that the overdue balance (~$488) was sent to them and they requested payment.  I already sent payment to the medical center a few days ago, which obviously wasn't yet processed.  I've never dealt with a collection even going back to my dirty file/rebuild days when I had 90-120 day late payments on accounts.  Doesn't this seem a bit abrupt... services received in March, billed in early April and sent to collections (after receiving a ~$500 payment) in June?  Just curious if there were any rules on this or what the thoughts of the group are here.  I always though that collections came into play once a debt was at least 90+ days old.  Obviously I'm not looking for a collection to land on my CR.  I'd imagine once the medical center processes the payment that they'd drop the collection, but I can't help but be a bit uneasy about the whole thing.

[Remedios]

A provider can send you to collections a day after statement is past due, but collection agency cannot report in the first 180 days. 

So, 180 days from the date account went delinquent is when they can start reporting.  

[Anonymous]

Gotcha.  That's at least 3-4 months away I'd guess at this point.  So once the medical center processes the payment (any day now) should I believe that they'll contact the collection agency and let them know the debt was already paid?  Is it worth calling the medical center an inquiring about this in (say) a week?  Or, do I call the collection agency and tell them that the debt was already paid to the medical center?  I'd assume if I did that, they'd call them to verify it was indeed paid already.  Is there anything at this point that I should be sweating, or really nothing to worry about?

[Remedios]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Gotcha.  That's at least 3-4 months away I'd guess at this point.  So once the medical center processes the payment (any day now) should I believe that they'll contact the collection agency and let them know the debt was already paid?  Is it worth calling the medical center an inquiring about this in (say) a week?  Or, do I call the collection agency and tell them that the debt was already paid to the medical center?  I'd assume if I did that, they'd call them to verify it was indeed paid already.  Is there anything at this point that I should be sweating, or really nothing to worry about?

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You would want to contact medical center, ask them to recall account from collections, then just finish paying to them

If they tell you they cannot recall but will inform collection agency of the payment, give it a few days then call CA and let them know when in July you intend to finish paying it off 

I would not sweat it reporting wise as long as you have copy of the first statement showing due date (just in case they try pulling something shady), but I would not drag it out too long in case you're dealing with less than scrupulous CA. 

[RobertEG]

There is no restriction on debt collectors regarding when they can report a medical collection to a CRA.

There is, however, a settlement agreement reached by the CRAs in which they (the big-3 CRAs) have agreed not to include medical collections in consumer credit reports until the delinquency period has reached at least 180 days.

The distinction is that your remedy for contesting the inclusion of a medical collection that has not yet reached 180 days from DOFD is not to contest the reporting by the debt collector, who is not a party to the civil settlement agreement, but rather to contact the CRA and rely upon their current policy per the settlement agreement.

[Anonymous]

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@Remedios wrote:

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You would want to contact medical center, ask them to recall account from collections, then just finish paying to them

If they tell you they cannot recall but will inform collection agency of the payment, give it a few days then call CA and let them know when in July you intend to finish paying it off 

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I already sent them the final payment.  Presumably it was received at this point, likely just not applied.  I always pay them with a CC form (gotta get those CB rewards) so I'm just checking my CC every day to see when they apply the payment.

Overall it sounds like I've got nothing to worry about reporting wise.  I'm far less concerned with this actual account, as even if it was somehow reported as Robert said above I could probably get it removed quickly/easily... but what concerns me a ton is the potential AA that my other creditors could take if they saw a collection pop up on my CR, even if it was only there for a week or two.