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What would be a good letter to write if you want to settle the debt, but you can only make payments instead of paying in full?
I found a sample letter here http://credit.about.com/od/debtcollection/a/payfordelete.htm
When I settled they offered me to pay 50% of the original debt (the debt had actually gone up to twice more of what I originally owed, so in theory I settled for 25% of the final amount). At this time I didn’t know I could negotiate an amount so I agreed, but I think it was reasonable.
There were a couple of articles that I found helpful, I just can’t find them right now. As soon as I do I’ll post the links here. If I remember well, if these are charge-offs you are trying to settle, I believe you can start as low as 25% but I’m not sure.
They are collection accounts. I was going to try starting at 25%, but I didn’t know if that was enough. If they do not accept the offer, do I write another letter with a higher percentage?
Hey guys, just an update on my post from 3 months ago. If you guys remember well, I had two pay for delete accounts (both medical bills), one was for $75 and the other for $230. The $75 one, I was able to negotiate without trouble. They said they would delete if paid in full, for which they provided a letter and two weeks after payment they deleted.
The other collection was a bit of a headache. It took me at least 3 months to get the collection off my report. I insisted on getting a letter which stated they would delete if paid in full, but they ignored my two letters regarding this, and just wrote in pen on one of their invoices a couple of lines saying that they would delete if I paid in full. The thing is, nobody signed it or anything, it was just written in pen. I thought, what the heck, I have no real proof but I had no problems with the other agency so I paid and hoped for the best…big mistake!
Of course they didn’t delete, they just changed the status to paid, which is a little better but still a delinquency. So, I decided to write them a nice letter reminding them about our agreement and that I would really appreciate if they helped me with this (I included a copy of their invoice where they wrote in ink and a copy of their collection appearing on my report). I sent the letter last Monday, and today (Thursday) I noticed they deleted it from my report! My score went up 11 points and I have no more collections on my report. I’m very excited!
I’ve been trying to get a goodwill deletion for a “paid charge-off” I have, but have been unsuccessful so far. I’ve written two letters and have tried to contact the bank through Planet Feedback but no luck so far. I’ll keep trying. If I can get this deleted from my report I’ll be in better shape to qualify for a mortgage.
It’s really hard to pay debts. Good thing there are some thing that can help us such as the debt-snowball. The debt-snowball method is a debt reduction strategy, whereby one who owes on more than one account pays off the accounts starting with the smallest balances first while paying the minimum on larger debts. Many people have probably heard of the “snowball” debt technique. The idea is to repay smaller debts first, giving a person a win they can point to, which “snowballs” as they pay off other debts. A brand new study, by researchers from Kellogg University, found that it actually works.
Okay guys. I have got some news to share. I know it has been a while. Anyhow, I sent out three pay for delete letters last month. Two of them were to the same company and one for a separate company. I only got one reply from the other company with the one debt. The debt is a $950 surgery bill that actually started at $1800 that I made payments on before I was really education about all of the credit stuff. So I offer to pay the bill for $475. I received a letter in the mail that the would settle with me for $682 and some change if I payed by Feb 28 and then the would take the steps in order to remove it from my credit file. It is more than I really wanted to pay but I am willing to accept this if it gets removed from my report, I know a lot of people wonder if this works so I thought I would share my latest experience. Also does anyone have any advice on the company that did not respond. I actually looked them up and even though they are a real collection agency they give a lot of people problems They are even rated an F by the BBB. Any advice is welcome. Thanks guys!
Hey Christie,
That’s great news. If you can pay your settlement go for it, It’s definitely worth it. If you feel it’s a bit too much you could try to negotiate the amount with them again . You can let them know that that’s the best you can do and see what they say. Keep in mind that collection agencies usually pay just a few cents per each dollar you owe to buy your account and then try to collect from you. I’m not sure if it works the same for medical collections, but I know this is the case for credit card collections.
As far as the other collection agency, I would just send them a letter again. Send a letter until you get a response. Sometimes it takes a while until you get a response, just be patient. It will pay off eventually. If all fails, you can wait until the collection is sold to a different agency and then try to negotiate with them. But from experience I’ve seen that most collection agencies are willing to negotiate, but sometimes it takes longer than you think.
Keep us posted!
I am going to try this with one bill that is about $55. I do owe them more on other bills but thought I would start with the smallest one.
I finally got notice today that the one bill that I did a pay for delete with finally removed it from my Experian report. Now I just need to push it to get removed from the other CRAs as well.
Hey that’s great news! I’m sure that will give your score a boost.
Have you heard from the other collection agency yet?
My wife is actually in a similar situation regarding a collection agency not responding. We’ve been sending letters to this agency and they keep ignoring us. I think it’s been almost a year already since the first letter. I’ve read that there are some agencies that as a policy do not send letters saying that they will delete, but that some might be willing to negotiate over the phone so, as much as I prefer to have everything in writing, we are thinking about calling to see if we can negotiate.
Debt has been removed from all CRAs! I am really excited. I now just have two medical debts left that I am still trying to get off. I cannot get any response from the collection agency. They did not respond to my pay for delete letter. They only sent me an updated bill in the mail. I am scared to call and speak with someone over the phone because I have heard that this agency is very rude, plus I would like a letter to fall back on in case they do not remove it from my file. Aren’t you worried that will happen to you guys?
Hi Christie, sorry for the late reply. Congratulations on getting that tradeline deleted, that’s great!
Yes, it worries me but it seems we don’t have a choice anymore. Let me know how it goes if you call them. I’ll keep you posted as well. We were going to call last week but we had other stuff to do and sort of forgot about it. Hopefully we’ll get to it this week.
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