Should I respond to the summons served by Zwicker and Associates?

Should I enter an response to the summons? I never have had a judgement. I am a stay at home mom to 4 boys , 1 of which is terminally ill and disabled. I am unable to work and have not in 15 years. My husband is losing his job. Will they still sue me?

Not responding will basically mean a defaut judgement against you.

You should check with your county court to determine if the summons is real, smells fishy to me.

What does it mean when the court date has been cancelled and a default judgement has been entered..what can i do? what do i need to give the court.

You should never ignore a summons. The end result could be anything from civil penalty/default judgement or criminal charges(not applicable here). First step, look at the summons you were presented with. The court will be noted on it, as well as contact information. Look up the contact information in your local phone directory or online to see if the phone number matches your paperwork. I've seen some companies give documentation like this but the phone number goes to their answering service, not a court. If it does match, call them and speak to the court clerk regarding the summons. They can't give you legal advice, but they can certainly verify if it's a real summons or not. They will also be able to tell you if there is a court date scheduled or not. If there is, I would recommend going to it. If not, you will receive a default judgement against you. A default judgment is the judgment given when you are sued and don't respond or appear in court. For example, if you are sued for $2,000 and you don't answer the summons and appear in court, the court will most likely award a default judgement to the plaintiff (the person/business suing you) and you will owe them $2,000 according to that court order. That is the first step in a somewhat drawn out process. Just because a judge finds in their favor doesn't mean that you have to pay them the money anyway. You don't have to worry about jail, because debtor's prisons and such were abolished long, long ago. If they get a default judgement, they must then file a motion or case with the court to go after the money they are owed from that judgement. That can be awarded in anything from a scheduled payment plan to garnishment of wages. Again, that's a process in itself. What happens most commonly is that if a debtor (person owing the money) doesn't pay it, they will be hounded by debt collection agencies. If they do file a lawsuit and end up with a default judgement, the burden is still on them to try to collect. It will be noted on your credit report that there is an outstanding judgement against you. It will be detrimental to your credit, and if you ever apply for a loan of any type or credit, you will be turned down. If that's the only negative mark hindering your credit, then you would be required to pay that debt before you would be able to secure a loan/credit again. I've been on both sides of the fence in this situation. I own a business and have had to chase down stray accounts that don't pay, and I have also been on the end where I've had the collectors calling me because I didn't make my payment because the people owing me didn't make theirs to me. Handy cycle.... Anyway, I hope this has been of some help.

This is good info. Also, while you are in court you can aurge the amount you owe. You can say "I don't think that amount is correct."
In which case the judge will give you more time to come up with the correct amount. This should give you at least 60 daysIn the mean time, file for Bankrupcy. It may be your best way out.

i read on one website about this type situation. upon receipt of the notice, verify with the local court that it is legit court date /suit. ask the court clerk how to to whom to file a response. then file a "debt validation" letter with/at proper place. sometimes you have to send this registered mail to the company suing. sometimes it is filed with the court and they send a copy to the company suing. they then have to provide proof of the amount of debt they are suing for. if it is a collection agency that has purchased the debt for pennies on the dollar, they can not validate the debt, and they will in turn cancel the suit. YOU WIN. you can also just show up to court and ask for the validation there, which will also borrow some time. i had a friend got a notice of suit and she did not appear at court, and they won by default. it was an old debt, from several years ago, that it was originally only $500, but by them winning by default, the debt is now over $3000...

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I too am being sued by Zwicker & Associates. As soon as I received the summons I verified it with the court and then looked up an attorney that might be able to help with this issue. Unfortunately Zwicker keeps very good records from what I can tell, they pulled pretty much every credit card statement I had for the card they were trying to collect on. This is because Zwicker doesn't own the debt, but they are representing the credit card company to try and recover the debt (in my case at least). My lawyer has been dragging this out for a little bit while we get things together. We have another court date coming up, in which we are going to file for a motion to compel arbitration. We will see how that goes. Just can't want to get this debt behind me! I am glad I found legal help to assist me along the way.

Just because Zwicker has documents does not mean they can provide a proper foundation and witness to get the docs into evidence. Your lawyer should know the meaning of hearsay and see it all over their affidavits.

In response to the original post you should choose your attorney (if you decide to use one) wisely. You want to use someone that will pick apart the inconsistencies in their documentation. I wouldn't "no show" a court date because you will definitely receive a judgement against you. A judge will rarely if ever rule in your favor if you decide not to show up or contact them. You want to verify all of the information with the judge that summoned you in order to be fully aware of the situation. When you know all of the information up front you will be in a better position to fight. Then show up on the appointed date and present all of the information you have at your disposal.

If you receive a summons from Zwicker, I guarantee you it's real. You only receive a photocopy because the court requires the original summons be filed in court or else the suit will get thrown out for failure to serve process. If that happens, all Zwicker has to do is file a Motion with the court to vacate judgment, and 99% of the time they win and the case is back on the docket. The discrepancy in dates on the original poster's summons is merely an oversight, because Zwicker represents way more credit card companies than just American Express and you can bet their workload is tremendous.

Whatever you do, don't just let it sit there without at least responding to it, or you WILL be defaulted - and that process is a LOT faster than you think. If you want to dispute the debt, it isn't too late to do so even if you've been served, no matter what anyone says. That's pretty much your best (if not only) chance to fight back. If you never respond, and your case gets defaulted and judgment is awarded to Zwicker, you have only a few months before judgment will be executed by the court, which means that Zwicker now has full authority to proceed with wage garnishments, bank levies, liens on your house/property, etc. At that point, you're in serious trouble. Not only will you owe the original amount of debt on the card, you'll owe interest that accrues on every single day since the debt was charged off and referred to Zwicker, plus all costs incurred by Zwicker to litigate your case. So your $1,000 credit card debt is now worth potentially $5,000 or more.

The process is fairly simple, and I guarantee you Zwicker has a massive team of litigants and assistants working every day on thousands of cases just like yours, so they know how to get tons of cases through the courts FAST.

Bottom line: don't let a summons go unanswered. If it makes you feel better, call the court if you don't believe your summons is real. I'm telling you it is.

Hope this helped~

I have received summons from Zwicker as well. Apparently, I missed a case management conference scheduled this past july 29. I may have misplaced the paperwork telling me this, but I did not have any paperwork on me that had the case management date. I was then issued another summons to appear in court on 8/26. This was a Request for Default Judgment pursuant to M.R.C.P 55(b)(2) - Plaintiff's Motion for Assessment of Damages - Withdrawal and Notice of appearance. However, this never happened because my Paperwork sent me to one court and Zwicker to another Court. It was agreed by the Court that Zwicker or I was not at fault regarding this issue. I received a Notice of Dismissal from the Court stating the case would be dropped unless the Plaintiff Re filed before 11/4/2010. They did this and my court date is Tuesday 11/2. I have been working with a Debt Settlment Company to help get rid of my debt and they handle all of the corresponce with the creditors. They suggested that I take a few things to court with me...
A Response to the Summons Issued - Debt/Hardship Letter - Income and Expense Worksheet showing the amount of money coming in vs. money going out each month and lastly, A Declaration Letter from my Debt Settlement Company confirming my involvement in their program and my good standing with them etc...
I do not have a Lawyer and could not afford one even if I wanted to. I know that it is beneficial for me to go to the Court Date and I will. I guess what I want to know is, what is going to happen? Are any of the Documents that I am bringing going to help me out at all? Will there be another step in the process? etc... What's the Big Picture look like for someone in this situation? Thanks

Is there a phone # for ann?

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After searching around for the above, I found this on another forum: Quote:

[QUOTE] [QUOTE]...This is done through motion for discovery. [/QUOTE]If I received and answered a summons denying and presenting my affirmative defenses, which they in turn answer with denials, is the next step theirs or mine? This was 6 months ago and according to online dockets is still where we are. Now I'm wondering if they are doing something or waiting for time to go by to get a default judgment without my knowledge. Is this the time where I should be or should have been filing the Motion for Discovery? And how would one go about doing this? Thanks in advance. [/QUOTE][QUOTE]After searching around for the above, I found this on another forum: [QUOTE]Normally you wouldn't file a discovery motion with the court unless and until you have asked for the information from the other party, and that party has failed to give you what you asked for.[/QUOTE]Would the 'more experienced' here agree? If so then how do I ask this from the plaintiff? I basically asked for this within my Affirmative Defenses in answering summons, stating for example, that they did not even refer to any account number whatsoever. (I honestly still do not know which card they are suing me for as I defaulted on 3). But I haven't "officially" asked THEM for this. Thanks again. [/QUOTE]Anyone? :confused: Please?

If you have not already, try your state's legal aid website. You may quality to talk to an attorney for free about this to get an answer. If not, these websites usually have detailed steps listed out on how to handle a situation. Most have the appropriate court forms to file and steps on how to complete and file them.

I hope for your sake, your debt relief company is not Freedom Debe Relief. They will leave you high and dry. They forget about you after they take their fee's and will not assist you with any court related issues. Choose another company and pass this on to all others standing in your shoes.