It is easy to get in over your head with credit cards. You have good credit habits, paying your bills every month. But something bad happens, that throws your schedule off.
You lose your job, or your spouse loses theirs. You or a family member is diagnosed with a disease. A family member runs up the bill without you knowing.
You justify putting groceries and other expenses on revolving credit, or even your car or mortgage payments, figuring you’ll make it up when your situation changes. Except it doesn’t change. When you miss a payment, your interest rates go up.
Now you’re in the soup
Unable to pay, you start getting bills in the mail, and phone calls. You are threatened with legal action. They make it sound like you could go to jail. It can be terrifying.
You are anxious to solve the problem, but you don’t want to resort to the “nuclear option,” starting life over after Chapter 7.
What do you do? You fight fire with fire, working with a credit lawyer to protect you from unfair collection practices.
What an attorney can do
First, the attorney can determine if the charges are just, or the result of a mistake – and correct the error.
Second, an attorney can assess whether the creditor has overstepped the law – which is not an uncommon thing — and engaged in account takeover or outright fraud.
Finally, the attorney can negotiate an acceptable out-of-court settlement. Most creditors prefer a payment plan that nets them something to a downward spiral that hurts both sides.
It is in both parties’ interest to find a solution to unpayable debt. You want to end the nightmare of harassment. They want a solution that puts money in their pocket and takes you off their list of bad cases.
If it has not occurred to you to work with an experienced credit lawyer to resolve your debt problems, you know now.
In the Pensacola area, the lawyer to call is Robert N. Heath. He has been protecting consumers from every kind of fraud and debt problem for years. He can help you, too.