Convergent Outsourcing help

[JustJay119]

Hello all. I need some advice on how to proceed with this collection account. Ive seen many threads which detail how to remove this account by paying the original creditor, however my mom went ahead and paid convergent directly.  They are now reporting the account as $0 balance but refuse to remove the account altogether. This was the letter received in the mail.

This letter is to confirm that on ***/2020 you agreed to the arrangement below

Payment of  $***

Payment Date ***/2020

Once the amount has been paid, the account, with the remaining balance, will be returned to T-Mobile, USA.

Please note that this is not an offer to settle, but an offer to remove your account from further collection efforts.

Sincerely,

yada yada yada

Is there any way to get these guys to remove the account. T-mobile already says that they will but dont seem to know how and convergent is saying that they wont.

[OmarGB9]

My mom got one of these, too, and from reading it over, my understanding is once you pay the amount they ask for, they will voluntarily return the account to T-Mobile to finish paying off the account. If they return the account, then I can only assume their collection authority is terminated, and by law when that happens, they MUST remove their collection off your reports.

[JustJay119]

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@OmarGB9 wrote:

My mom got one of these, too, and from reading it over, my understanding is once you pay the amount they ask for, they will voluntarily return the account to T-Mobile to finish paying off the account. If they return the account, then I can only assume their collection authority is terminated, and by law when that happens, they MUST remove their collection off your reports.

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Thats what im assuming too but do i dispute with credit bureaus or file a complaints against convergent.

[OmarGB9]

Well first, how long ago did she pay? If it's only been a month, or less, I would give it another month or two, because typically with collections/PFDs what happens is they take one cycle to update the balance to zero, then another cycle to remove their reporting altogether.

[JustJay119]

it'll be two months in about a week. We will give it some time. Thanks

[OmarGB9]

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@JustJay119 wrote:

it'll be two months in about a week. We will give it some time. Thanks

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If they don't delete within a couple of weeks, then I'd look into getting contact info for them to begin GW removal.

[JustJay119]

yeh thats seems to be the general consensus. Thanks

[martypav7]

I just went thru that with Sprint. Do not pay Convergent, if you want it gone pay T-mobile. After i paid Sprint it was gone within a week. 

[OmarGB9]

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@martypav7 wrote:

I just went thru that with Sprint. Do not pay Convergent, if you want it gone pay T-mobile. After i paid Sprint it was gone within a week. 

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Unfortunately OP's mom already paid Convergent directly.

[RobertEG]

A key factor is what specifically was agreed upon when she paid x-amount to the debt collector.

Was it agreed or stated, either orally or in writing, that the payment would be considered settlement of the debt, or was it agreed or implied that it would only reduce the remaining debt balance, and additionally result in the debt collector ceasing any futher collection activities?

If the debt was, in fact, agreed to have been settled by the payment, then the remaining debt balance would be $0.

Three would be no remaining debt to return for any further collection activities to or by the original creditor.

If settled, it would also not require the debt collector to delete their reported collection.

To the contrary, the official policy of each of the big-3 CRAs is that payment or settlement of the debt is not basis for reporting deletion of a collection.

However, if she merely agreed that payment would be accepted as a partial payment of the debt, for which the debt collector would then terminate any continued collection activities and return the collection to the original creditor, then the collection would have been terminated without discharge of the entire debt.

That would involve deletion of the reported collection,and not just update of the balance under collection to $0.

Deletion of a collection is only mandated if the debt collector's collection authority is terminated with the debt remaing unpaid.   That is only a policy of the CRAs, and is NOT a requirement of law.

It is a policy established by the CRAs in recognition that if a prior collection has been terminted with the debt remaining unpaid, the original creditor can then assign or sell the unpaid debt to another debt collector, which could result in two collections simultaneously reporting on the same debt.  That is something that the CRAs want to avoid by the policy of requiring deletion of the first collection.

It is thus critical to first establish what was agreed when the payment was made, which will then determine whether or not there is any policy requiring deletion of the collection.