Expert: Ontrack Financial Group llc - 7/17/2008

Question
I live in the state of Ohio, Cuyahoga county. I had a credit  card with capital one, last day of activity is July, 2000. I am currently being sued by a collection company that has purchased the debt. I thought  the statue of limitations was 6 years but they are saying it is based on contract law and the statue is 15 years. The court is giving me 2 weeks to file a response or they will enter a judgement.

Who is correct on the statue of limitations? If I am right, how can I prove it in my response?

Thank You,

William

Answer
It looks to me like you are dealing with a debt collection agency that has bought OUT OF STATUTE PAPER.  What that means is that some collection agency or attorney has purchased your original debt that was due in a bulk sale called a portfolio.

Most of the time these accounts are so old that they can not even be reported on your credit report.

Well, that is exactly what is happening to you.

The account that the company is attempting from is OLD.  They are prohibited by the terms of the Fair Credit Reporting Act to add it to your credit report.

So the only option that they have is to sue you, IF the statute of limitations has not passed.

Here is a good link to review all of the statutes in all 50 States on the limitations:

http://www.creditinfocenter.com/rebuild/statuteLimitations.shtml

In Ohio, you will notice that the Statute for an Open Ended Account (Which is what a credit card falls under is only six years)

So, based upon this, here is what I want you to do.

1.  Send another certified letter to this debt collection company and the court that sent you the letter demanding that they produce all of the original MEDIA on the file. That means that you want each and every statement and each and every charge slip. They are REQUIRED to provide this to you.

Once you send this demand letter to the agency, they will realize that you understand that this account is out of statute and that their threats are not only immoral but ILLEGAL, as they CAN NOT LIEN YOUR HOME without a court judgment, and the debt is out of statute so there will be no order.

2. Send a copy of this letter to the collection agency and demand that they provide you with a letter declaring that the account be closed.

If they still call you and play the threatening game, record the calls and get the tapes to me and we will post them on our site and you will probably have an FDCPA claim for 1K for EACH CALL THEY MAKE TO YOU.

Ontrack Financial Group