Monday, August 17th, 2009

How is it legal for credit companies to pursue amounts due after a credit card co. has charged off an account?

Credit Card Companies
dockside-gus asked:


I am referring to collection agencies that try to collect after a credit card company has written off a debt. How and where do these company get the information and who gets the money if it is collected? Seems to me that anything collected after a company has written off a debt woulkd be illegal.

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6 Responses to “How is it legal for credit companies to pursue amounts due after a credit card co. has charged off an account?”

SCH Says:
August 17th, 2009 at 11:34 am

Once a company has charged off a debt they sell it to collections companies so they can try to collect you debt and recoupe the monies. So yes, once a debt has been charged off that is exactly what happens, it gets sold and collectors come after you.

The collections company gets the money because the company that sold them the debt recouped their money when they sold it. I is perfectly 100% legal.

Chane Says:
August 19th, 2009 at 4:34 am

The credit card company writes off the debt and sends the account to a collection agency.

The credit card company transfers all of your information to them. It’s prefectly legal.

Just because they charged off an account doesn’t mean that you don’t still owe them money. They are just done trying to collect it for you, so they assign or sell the account to the CA.

slabberdasken Says:
August 19th, 2009 at 5:02 pm

Buying, and collecting, charged-off debts is a billion dollar business. Credit card companies usually give up trying to collect from you after about six months. Then the debt is charged to their profit and loss account and sold to a Junk Debt Buyer (JDB) at great discounts. JDBs can collect the entire amount plus any interest and fees.

spifiman1 Says:
August 22nd, 2009 at 10:05 pm

If that were true, credit collection companies would not exist.

When the credit card company writes off your debt all that means is that they have given up on collecting it. Write off is a bookkeeping term. It has nothing to do with you not owing the debt anymore.

They then sell it to a collection company who comes after you. It’s all legal and the collection company gets the money.

flamingojohn Says:
August 23rd, 2009 at 9:14 am

The collection companies buy that debt for pennies on the dollar from the original creditor and have full right to collect whatever they can from it- regardless of the charge off from the original creditor.

Cara D Says:
August 25th, 2009 at 4:27 pm

It was no longer worth the time or money spent on trying to collect the money for the creditor, so they sold it to the collection company and washed their hands of it. You no longer owe that creditor money, but you do owe the new owner of the debt money….This is big business nd it is completely legal. The collection companies do have a stricter set of rules to comply with than the original creditor trying to collect its own debt, but I tend to think that many of these companies are not compliant with these rules. Study up on the FDCPA and pay attention to what this company is saying and doing, you might be able to sue them for harrassment…but all in all…morally…you have a debt to pay.

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