How to make creditors stop harassing you
Author: FrankV Total views: 22 Word Count: 559
It's been happening every night, just as you and your family are sitting down to dinner. It's another harassing call from a creditor - you don't even have to pick up the phone to know. The caller ID tells you the whole story. It's a number from some other part of the country that you don't recognize. It's irritating, it's stressful and you wish it would just stop.
It can be so embarrassing and nerve wracking to have creditors harassing you. They call you all the time, even at work. Don't you have some rights? Isn't there something, anything you can do?
There are actually several things you can do to stop creditors from harassing you. You should act quickly - first time you receive a harassing phone call from a creditor, send the creditor a letter by certified mail to make sure they receive it. This is known as a "Do Not Call" letter. In it, you will ask that they no longer harass you with phone calls and tell them how to properly contact you
One way to keep these harassing calls from happening is to call the company to whom you owe as soon as you know you will be unable to pay on time. You can attempt to work out a payment schedule with them, which will show them that you are acting in good faith and intend to pay what you owe.
You should keep a log of calls from creditors if you are having this problem. Write down when they called, what debt they called about, who they are collecting the debt for and the name of the person calling you. Unless it is illegal in your state, record these calls and tell the callers that they are being recorded; this may even prevent more calls!
You do have some protection under federal law. A creditor can't call you after 9 pm or before 8 am. After you send them a "Do Not Call" letter, they may only call you once more after that to acknowledge that they will cease calling you. Most importantly, they cannot, by law, call you at work, period
Creditors also may not threaten or harass your children, threaten to take action which is beyond the few actions which are legally available to them (more on this in a minute), or talk to anybody not involved with the debt about the matter. They cannot put you in prison (or threaten to) and cannot confiscate property or garnish wages, unless said property was put up as collateral for a loan.
By law, there are three things a creditor can do. They can sue you to recoup what you owe, they can refuse to do business with you any longer and they can report your debt to a credit bureau. It is exceedingly unlikely that they will sue you, as this will generally cost more than what you owe. The one case in which they may seize assets is in the case that you have something as collateral on a loan.
Another thing they cannot do is bully and harass you. You are a citizen and you have legal rights and protections. If you are being harassed by a creditor, you can stop them. You don't have to be treated badly on account of debt which you fully intend to repay.
Article Source: Credit Card Bad Credit People
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