Assigned to Outside Collections 1 Day after Receiving 10 day Notice

[johncoctostan25 0]

I received a FINAL NOTICE from University of Utah Health Care Collections.  Letter dated 1/29/2014.  Received 2/11/2014.  It gave 10 days to pay balance before assigning to outside collections.  I called today to resolve (account is in dispute - I certainly owe some of the money, but am disputing some of the charges).  They told me it had been assigned to outside collections on 1/30/2014, 1 day into the 10-day notice period.

 

Is this legal?  What should I do?

[admin 896]

Unfortunately, it's legal.  However, you should call Utah Health Care Collections to see if you can pay them and not the outside company.  What would even be better is if you can pay the original creditor instead of one of these collections firm.  

[Wins the Battle 158]

Keep in mind that one of the favorite scare tactics of creditors is "we will send you to outside collections."

 

If the creditor is a hospital, then you can pretty much assume that is an office down the hall from the main hospital collections desk.

 

I got sent to collections for an ER bill for my son, way back in the 90's. As with you, the debt was in dispute, but the hospital paid the dispute no mind.

 

I actually talked to the woman at the collections agency, she told me to write my version down and send it in.

 

I was never billed for that care, again. 

 

This was 20 years ago, so who knows what the result would be today. But it's worth a try. WRITE the specifics of your dispute, and send CMRRR. See what happens.