Summons served from Palisades Collection Company

Okay first off, you have to contact Palisades with the phone number on the summons and talk to them about it and see what they want to do. Or the lawyer representing Palisades, whichever the number is on the summons. I got a summons from a lawyer a while back over sams club and the sheriff told me to call the number on the summons and talk to them. It was the number to the lawyers. They will either give you a chance to pay it in full===which if you do that, you won't have to go to court! and it won't show up on your credit report. If you do payments, you will still have to go to court and it does still go on your credit report. The only way to keep it off of your credit report is to take care of before court. They lawyer will tell you by what date to have the payment in to them in order for them to cancel the court date. hope I have helped. been there most definitely done that! shirley

Oh and I forgot to add, thanks for posting this about Palisades, I heard from them on an AT&T account and asked them for validation and they wrote back and told me that they are 'working' on it and it could take up to 90 days. So good to know that if they do come back with validation that they will sue. I'll have to handle them with kid gloves when they do come back and validate it all to me. I've already been sued once, don't want to do that again. That was on my credit report, this time it will be on my husbands. have to do whatever I can to keep that kind of stuff off of his report, hes the bread winner in our family. thanks--I learned something too. shirley

help03--if you talk to the lawyers and work something out as far as monthly payments, it will still go to court and the judgement will still show up on your credit report and you will have court costs and fees to pay. If you settle in a one lump payment before court, it will be dropped and you will save yourself court cost and fees and the BIG hardship of it showing up as a judgement on your credit report. Equifax has their report set up to where when you have a judgement, THATS THE FIRST THING on the page! so if you have the funds to where you can pay it off before court, that would be your best bet. If not, the lawyers most likely will take monthly payments but that won't stop it from showing up on your credit report for the next 7 years.
Oh and did I mention that with sams club, I was ALREADY paying them and had been for the past 7 months? they were cashing my check every month and still sicked the lawyers on me and sued me! I didn't even see it coming!

Few points here:

Have Palisade ever contacted you for this debt? You have mentioned that you sent a letter of settlement which they ignored. Do you have any valid proof for this letter? I don't know whether you asked for validation or not. However, if consumer asks for validation, CA is not allowed to bring legal action against the consumer without validation the debt.

Now, at this situation, you should call the attorney and see if they are interested to settle it out of court or not. I understand that $1200 is a high amount and it's tough to pay it in full. However, there is no harm in negotiating with them, right? Judgment is a negative entry and once it enters your credit report, it stays there for 7 years. So it will be better if you can avoid it.

If they case ultimately goes to court, hire a lawyer to defend you. They did not respond to your settlement offer, so they were unwilling to work with you. This point might help you in court. Keep us posted.

Hi Stan,

I originally sent a letter to work out a settlement to the original creditor which was Chase and never heard back from them. I do not have a letter from Palisades stating that were going to sue me, I just had a marshall show up at my door yesterday with papers.

help, had you gotten anything at all in the past from Palisades? have they tried to collect on the debt before this?

I think CA cannot sue you without trying to collect the debt. Since summon has reached to you, they have your right contact address with them. Now they cannot say that they tried to contact but you did not reply.

How can they go to without following any collection activities? I strongly suggest you consulting a lawyer to see if you can win the judgment. Another question, how old the account is? Have you checked the SOL?

When I spoke with them today they stated they mailed me something in October 2005 but I do not recall receiving it. It may have been sent to my old PO box address. Wouldn't the documentation need to be sent to me certified mail to make sure I received.

help---for some reason not many collectors send things certified anymore. They used to but not so much anymore. I wondered the same thing when sheriff came to the front door with the summons from the lawyers for sams club. When I called, all they wanted was for my monthly payment to be increased, I agreed with no problems. Now why couldn't they have just sent something certified to me..instead of going through all of this extreme. and I simply agreed, but you know, they were already taking me to court and the only way to stop it then was to pay it in full. since I didn't have it, it was full steam ahead.

Wouldn't the documentation need to be sent to me certified mail to make sure I received.