Are you tired of debt collectors? You’re not the only one. A lot of people are tired of coming home after a long day of work, only to find that they are bombarded with tons and tons of missed voicemails from debt collectors. As much as debt collectors hit your answering machine, they have a purpose for it — they are trying to collect a debt. And they’re bound by certain legal rules in the pursuit of collecting that debt from you. You just need to make sure that you really think as much as possible on how to stop them without keeping them from doing their job.
What do we really mean by that? Well, it’s simple. If you decide to block off all contact with the debt collectors, they might just decide that suing you in court ifs really the only way to get through to you. If that happens, you’re going to need to make sure that you can at least tell your side of the story. The only time where you shouldn’t worry about a lawsuit is when you know that the debt in question is “time barred”, which means that they can’t collect from you in the first place.
So if you’re at a loss when it comes to that side of things, you’re really going to want to make sure that you use cease and desist orders carefully.
Now, keep in mind that we’re not telling you that you can’t use cease and desist orders. We’re not telling you that they don’t work. We’re not telling you that these orders don’t get things done. But it’s the blunt force use of them that usually leads to trouble.
As mentioned before, if you issue a debt collection agency a blanket cease and desist barring them from all contact, they are going to move towards the lawsuit part of things. That means that you will potentially run the risk of having a judgment on your credit report — which brings your score down even more.
What you need to do from here is make sure that you use a specific cease and desist order. You will need to make sure that when you send the cease and desist letter that you’re actually looking at giving them a way to contact you. If you’re tired of the phone calls, by all means tell them that they cannot call you anymore. But make sure that you still give them permission to contact you by letter.
When you really think about it, it’s better that they contact you via letter in the first place. This is because it’s going to establish a paper trail that you can use later in fighting the debt in the first place. Collection agencies aren’t going to let you record them — that’s something that people don’t realize. If a collector thinks that you’re recording them, they will ask you to stop. If you do not stop, they’re going to end the phone call. And it’s most likely that your account will be noted with this information, which could trigger them giving up and just taking you to court anyway.
There’s a lot to think about when you’re trying to fight the collection agencies — make sure that you’re fighting well!